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SPEECH 

CLEVELAND, Oof 



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ON. J. B. HENDERSON 



OF MISSOURI. 



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THE PRESENT CONDITION OF THE COUNTRY AND THE REMEDY FOR EXISTING EVILS; 



DELrVTlKED 



IN THE UNITED STATES SENATE, FEBRUARY 13 AND 14, 18G6. 



WASHINGTON: 
PRINTED AT THE CONGRESSIONAL GLOBE OFFICE. 

1SG6. 



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APPORTIONMENT OF REPRESENTATION. 



The Senate, as in Committee of the Whole, having 
under consideration the joint resolution (H. R. No. 
51) proposing an amendmentlto the Constitution of 
the United States — 

Mr. HENDERSON said : 

Mr. President: I shall certainly have to 
ask the pardon of the Senate on this occasion 
'£or attemj^ting to speak on a question of so 
much importance without the preparation that 
it is entitled to ; but I feel, in regard to the con- 
stitutional amendments now pending before 
the body, that if we do anything at all we ought 
to act speedily. It is not well to postpone ac- 
tion upon this matter for a great length of time. 
A large number, I believe twenty-two, of the 
State Legislatures are now in session, and if 
we are seriously in earnest about amending the 
Constitution of the United States we ought to 
send the amendment out to those State Legis- 
latures as early as we can. 

I believe it was Sir Jacob Astley who, just 
after the last battle between Charles and the 
Parliament, when he fell into the hands of the 
Parliament troops as a prisoner, remarked to 
^e commanders of the Parliament forces — 
Cromwell and his party — " Now, gentlemen, 
you have the game in your own hands, and can 
act as you choose unless you fall out among 
yourselves." I have thought during this ses- 
sion of Congress that we were likely to get into 
a condition similar to that immediately suc- 
ceeding the overthrow of the troops of Charles. 
Ourpresentcondition is bad enough — notworse 
perhaps, than two years ago, but bad enough 
to accept the plainest talk. 

I said I have made no preparation, or scarcely 
any whatever, for the remarks I intend to sub- 
mit. Perhaps it is better that I have made 
none, for when gentlemen write what they have 
to say they sometimes are quite guarded, so 
careful as not to express what they teel. I hope 
on this occasion that I shall say exactly what I 
do feel, regardless of the consequences, intend- 



ing, however, to be disrespectful to no one. 
What is said may not be connected. It may 
want in succinctness of statement, in logical 
sequence, and oflFend the delicate ear of the fin- 
ished scholar. It may require patience to 
listen, and possibly not be listened to, but, 
struggling against all difficulties, I shall stagger 
onto the end. 

I do not know in what particular political 
classification I may be ranked. Nor does it 
naatter. I think I know something of the con- 
dition of the country; and I believe I know 
somewhat of the things necessary to remedy 
the difficulties now upon us. However, about 
that I may be mistaken ; and I have some rea- 
son to doubt, since the honorable Senator from 
Illinois [Mr. Trdmbull] — I regret he is not 
now in his seat — took occasion, a few days since, 
to compare me with old Dr. Townsend, of sar- 
saparilla notoriety. I have since been discuss- 
ing in my own mind whether the old doctor 
was not at last something more than a quack ; 
whether he was not as good physician as many 
others who assume a little more dignity, and 
pass as the most eminent men with far less 
merit. Perhaps I sometimes express opinions 
with too much zeal. It is to be regretted if in 
the expression of views I wound the feelings ot 
anybody. Nothing of the sort is intended. I 
said I did not know to what classification I may 
be assigned. I do not know whether I am to 
be termed a Radical, a Conservative, or a Dem- 
ocrat. I am willing to occupy any designation 
to which the expression of views, honestly en- 
tertained, may assign me. Those views may 
not accord entirely with the views of any of the 
leading parties. 

Speaking of parties, Mr. President, I see that 
in a conversation which the President of the 
United States had with some gentlemen from 
Virginia a day or twoago, he gave expression 
to sentiments indicating most clearly that he 
entertains fears of some real or imaginary ex- 



treme party in the loyal States. I take it that 
he means the radical party as now known. That 
party may be dangerous, but it is not so bad as 
the President seems to think. Its instincts are 
generally good. Its dangers rest chieliy in timid 
minds. Let me preface what I may say with 
the remark that honestly and sincerely, since 
the present Executive took his seat as Presi- 
dent of the United States after the death of our 
lamented Lincoln, I have supported his Admin- 
istration. I did not concur in some points of 
his reconstruction jjolicy, but trusting in his 
fidelity and better means of information I was 
willing to waive all differences and give him an 
earnest support. My object and jDurpose have 
been to restore, if possible, and at the earliest 
day practicable, the Union of these States. He 
seemed to aim at the same end. It may be re- 
membered, if Senators take any interest in the 
little I do or say on any subject here, that on 
the 24th of last February I advocated the ad- 
mission of the Louisiana and Arkansas Sena- 
tors, not that I believed Mr. Lincoln had au- 
thority to do much that was done preparatory 
to the election of those Senators, not that I 
believed the military authorities possessed the 
power to do many things they did preparatory 
to that election, but I waived the want of for- 
mality and was willing to accept them as the 
representatives of loyal organizations. The 
war was then flagrant, and it was our policy, I 
thought, to segregate the loyal from the disloyal. 
It was deemed best to encourage Union men to 
create and rally around State organizations as 
the most efficient agency for suppressing rebel- 
lion in the respective States. My hope was that 
the President had assurances that true and 
genuine loyalty would enter into the govern- 
ments of the States to be reorganized under his 
proclamation; that the rebel element would 
abstain from participation in restoring civil 
relations, to break which they had waged four 
years of bloody and savage war. 

The Senator from Ohio, [Mr. Wade,] some 
days since — and I now refer to it in all kindness 
— said that Mr. Johnson's proposition for the 
restoration of these States was far preferable 
to the plan of Mr. Lincoln, but he was opposed 
to both. I care nothing about plans, Mr. Pres- 
ident. It is best to look to results. I will not 
wrangle with the Senator about the relative 
merit of the two plans. He should remember, 
however, that those men who participated in 
the reorganization of Louisiana and Arkansas 
were Union men. They of necessity were Union 
men ; because the war was then going on, and 
none other than bold and earnest Union men 
dared participate in the reorganization of those 
States while confederate soldiers were yetunder 
arms 

Mr. WADE. I believe the Senator has not 
exactly got my words. I think I did not say 
"preferable." I think that I said he went 
much further in requiring guarantees thun 



Mr. Lincoln had done ; and I do not know but 
that that might be considered preferable. 

Mr. HENDERSON. I did not design to 
misstate the position of the Senator from Ohio. 
It matters not what may be the merit of the 
two plans. If the circumstances be considered, 
Lincoln's plan was preferable, for the circum- 
stances were then such that none but loyal men 
would participate. Under Johnson's plan the 
circumstances were such that disloyal men 
could and did participate. •, 

Mr. WADE. If the Senator will oppose then /, 
that is all I ask. [Laughter.] "^ 

Mr. HENDERSON. I said nothing about 
opposing them nor accepting them. The ques- 
tion raised by the Senator was one of compara- 
tive merit between the plans. The plans might 
have been substantially the same, and yet the- 
results be essentially different. As vegetation is 
varied by climate, so are the. consequences of 
human action varied by surrounding circum- 
stances. Congress was not obliged to accept 
Mr. Lincoln's plan. It could accept or reject. 
It has the same discretion with Mr. Johnson's 
plan. If accepting the organizations would tend 
to restore Union and harmony they ought to be 
accepted. If those organizations are in rebel 
hands their recognition must complicate our 
troubles. 

The men who presented themselves here at the 
last session of Congress, underthe Lincoln plan, 
were elected by Union men in their respective M 
States. Do we not know perfectly well that no T! 
confederate soldier took part in the reorganiza- 
tion of the State governments of Louisiana and 
Arkansas ? Do we not know that rebel soldiers 
would have broken up those organizations if 
they could ? Do we not know that almost every 
man in those States who segregated himself from 
the rebel army because of his Unionism did par- 
ticipate in their reorganization ? 

Mr. Lincoln, it is true, prescribed an oath as 
a condition of the amnesty which he offered; J 
Mr. Johnson prescribed a similar oath : but look * 
at the change of circumstances. When waj^ 
Louisiana reorganized ? During the pendencj/ 
of hostilities. When was Arkansas reorgan- 
ized? In the midst of rebellion, when rebels 
had the highest hopes of success. Those men 
who were secessionists were opposed to the re- 
organization, and constituted the party of oppo- 
sition. Those who advocated restoration were 
men tried in the fires of war and the persecu- 
tions of political hatred. But last spring the 
confederate armies surrendered, and the war 
was over. Lee' s army surrendered in the early 
part of April, just before Lincoln' s death ; John- 
ston' s army surrendered about the liJth of April, 
and Kirby Smith' s army some time near the mid- 
dle of May. On the 29th of May Mr. Johnson 
issued his proclamation of amnesty. I will read 
a portion of that proclamation in order to show 
exactly what condition of afi'airs, legally and in 
fact, followed its issuance. 



The President's object, of course, was to 
begin the work of restoration. He sought a 
basis to begin on, and honestly, no doubt, sought 
a loyal basis. He so says in his late message. 
He evidently designed that all men receiving 
the benefit of his pardon might, if they chose, 
participate in reorganizing the respective State 

fovernments. He thought they would be loyal, 
n other words, they who were pardoned, re- 
gardless of their former crimes in the great 
-^ drama of rebellion, and regardless of their pres- 
'ent feelings toward the General Government, 
were to become participants in the work of re- 
creating loyal State governments. The Presi- 
dent says : 

" To the end, therefore, that the authority of the 
Government of the United States may be restored, 
and that peace, order, and freedom may be estab- 
lished, I, Andrew Johnson, President of the United 
States, do proclaim and declare that I hereby grant 
to all persons who have, directly or indirectly, par- 
ticipated in the existing rebellion, except as herein- 
after excepted, amnesty and pardon, with restoration 
of all rights of property except as to slaves and except 
in cases where legal proceedings under the laws of 
the United States providing for the confiscation of 
property of persons engaged in rebellion have been 
instituted; but upon the condition, nevertheless, that 
every such person shall take and subscribe the fol- 
lowing oath, (or atfirmation,) and thenceforward keep 
and maintain said oath inviolate ; and which oath 
shall be registered for permanent preservation, and 
shall be of the tenor and effect following, to wit: 

"I, , do solemnly swear, (or affirm,) in pres- 
ence of Almighty God, that I will henceforth faith- 
fully support, protect, and defend the Constitution of 
the United States and the Union of the States there- 
under; that I will in like manner abide by and faith- 
fully support all laws and proclamations which have 
been made during the existing rebellion with refer- 
ence to the emancipation of slaves. So help me God." 

It will be observed that the oath is entirely 
prospective. It did not propose to purge the 
conscience on the subject of voluntary and pre- 
meditated treason, to draw a line of distinction 
between the rebel officer and the unwilling 
conscript soldier. It asked only future obedi- 
ence to the Constitution, which stern necessity 
had already enforced. It asked only a recog- 
nition of freedom to the slave, a fact already 
^^established without the aid of rebel oaths. 
i Senators will remember that there were vari- 
ous exceptions, numbering fourteen different 
classes, named in this proclamation. The Con- 
stitution of the United States gives to the Pres- 
ident the power to grant reprieves and pardons, 
but it may be considered, I submit, by Senators 
who are familiar with the common law on the 
subject of pardon, and I presume all are, whether 
the President of the United States would have 
Iiad any authority to issue this general amnesty 
or general pardon except by virtue of an act of 
Congress. I do not deny that in any single 
case, by virtue alone of the constitutional pro- 
vision, the President may grant a certificate of 
pardon. I do not doubt that he can grant it 
before conviction, as well as after conviction. 
He cannot give a license or indulgence to com- 
mit crime ; but after a crime is committed, all 
he has to do in his certificate is to specify par- 



ticularly the crime that has been committed 
and for which the pardon is granted. But it 
may well be denied that but for the act of Con- 
gress of July 17, 1862, of which my friend from 
New Hampshire before me [Mr. Clark] was 
perhaps the chief draughtsman, the President 
would have any authority to grant a general 
pardon or amnesty. I must admit that that act 
is quite full. Let me refer to it. The thirteenth 
section is in these words : 

"Sec. 13. And be it further enacted. That the Presi- 
dent is hereby authorized, at any time hereafter, by 
proclamation, to extend to persons who may have 
participated in the existing rebellion in any State or 
part thereof, pardon and amnesty, with such excep- 
tions and at such time and on such conditions as he 
may deem expedient for the public welfare." 

It will not be disputed that by virtue of that 
authority the President had power to issue his 
proclamation of general amnesty. But disputes 
may arise on other questions connected with 
this proclamation. What was the condition upon 
which the pardon was to inure to the benefit of 
the party pardoned? It was first that he should 
file the oath named and in the manner to be 
prescribed. But this is not of itself sufficient. 
There is something more necessary that the 
benefits of the pardon should inure. 

According to the common law, and when we 
undertake to construe our Constitution we must 
construe it with reference to that law which ex- 
isted among us at the time and with which our 
forefathers were perfectly familiar, perhaps the 
best system of law devised for the administra- 
tion of justice among men, it is not only neces- 
sary that the party shall have filed this oath, 
but it is necessary that he shall have kept the 
oath. The President provides, in the close of 
the proclamation, that "the Secretary of State 
will establish rules and regulations for admin- 
istering and recording said amnesty oath, so as 
to insure its benefit to the people and guard the 
Government against fraud. ' ' I believe the Sec- 
retary of State i^rovided those rules and regu- 
lations under which parties who intended to 
take the benefit of this amnesty could take it. 
The taking of the oath is the technical accept- 
ance of the pardon. The actual performance 
of thg things, sworn to be done, is the condition 
of the pardon. If the condition be broken the 
pardon is void. The oath is that the party tak- 
ing it will henceforward "faithfully support, 
protect, and defend the Constitution of the Uni- 
ted States and the Union of the States there- 
under," and that he will "in like manner abide 
by and fixithfully support all laws and procla- 
mations which have been made during the ex- 
isting rebellion with reference to the emancipa- 
tion of slaves." 

First, then, if one has failed to take the oath 
prescribed, and in the manner prescribed, the 
pardon does not attach, and second, although 
he may have taken the oath, unless he has com- 
plied with it, that is, unless he has faithfully 
supported ' ' all laws and proclamations which 



6 



have been made during the existing rebellion 
with reference to the emancipation of slaves," 
the pardon as to him is void and its benefits 
are forfeited. 

I have looked to some of the authorities on the 
subject of pardon, and refer to this point for the 
purpose of obtaining, if possible, a legal solution 
of existing difficulties. Those difficulties are 
great, but the powers of the Government must 
be large enough to secure its own existence, to 
perpetuate the principles of liberty which lie 
at its foundation, as well as to vouchsafe the 
happiness of the people. The Union may be 
restored in truth and in fact, without violating a 
principle of that instrument, and indeed with- 
out rejecting the unwritten traditions of the 
fathers. I-i^ropose, in a moment, to examine the 
condition of the people in the seceded States, 
the character of the organizations before us, and 
what the powers and duties of Congress are. 

It will then be proper to incpure, how far this 
act of amnesty by the President relieved these 
parties in the seceding States? What rights it 
legally conferred? What the President under- 
took to relieve them of? How far he was ad- 
vised of the precise character of their offenses? 
Whether he had any jjower independent of the 
act of Congress already cited to pardon gen- 
erally? If not, then the extent of that general 
pardon under said act ? How far it has been 
accepted and to what extent its benefits have 
been forfeited? And lastly, as I have said, the 
powers of Congress in the j^remises? I do not 
propose to elaborate these points, but suggest 
them for the solution of abler men, who have 
more immediate charge of reconstruction. The 
President says — 

"I hereby grant to all persons who have, directly 
or indirectly, participated in the existing rebellion, 
except as hereinafter excepted, amnesty and pardon, 
with restoration of all rights of property, except as to 
slaves, and except in cases where legal proceedings 
under the laws of the United States providing for the 
confiscation of property of persons engaged in rebel- 
lion have been instituted." 

Of what does he relieve them? Of anything 
except the penalty prescribed in the act of July 
17, 18G2? Does the pardon restore the person 
accepting it to full rights of citizenship? In 
other words, did the voluntary rebel forfeit any 
political right by his rebellion ? He forfeited 
his life and property under the act named. 
The President's pardon did not assume to do 
more than restore to him his life and prop- 
erty. Is there not a political cpiestion behind 
this, that belongs to Congress and which does 
not come within the power of the President 
either under the clause of the Constitution or 
the law named? But assuming that the force 
of the pardon was sufficient to restore both 
civil and political rights forfeited, then has the 
condition of the pardon been kept? 

On the subject of conditional pardons, the 
case of Wells ex i^nrte, 18 Howard's Reports, 
where the whole question of pardon was dis- 
cussed ably and learnedly, may be referred to. 



Wells was convicted of murder in the District 
of Columbia, and President Fillmore pardoned 
him, on the condition, however, that he should 
take, in lieu of capital punishment, imprison- 
mentinthepenitentiaryof the District of Colum- 
bia for and during his life. On the next day, I 
believe, he applied for a writ of habeas corpus, 
his counsel taking the ground that the condition 
was void, because no man could sell his liberty, 
and that the pardon attached and was perfect 
and complete. The Supreme Court decided ,A 
that the condition might be legally attached, ■ ' ' 
and that the party instead of selling himself 
into slavery, preserved his life, which was al- 
ready forfeited to the law in consequence of 
his crime, that he had no body which was his 
to sell into slavery, and that really he saved his 
life by the acceptance. This subject of con- ^^ 
ditional j^ardons, the extent of executive au- 
thority, and the forfeiture of the benefits arising 
from pardon, have received consideration in 
numerous cases. See Cathcarti^s. Robinson, 5 
Pet. R., 204-280; 8 Watts and Serg., 197; 7 
Pet. , 150 ; 1 Bailey S. C' 283 ; New York Legal 
Observer, 177. 

I believe in the State of my distinguished 
friend from New York [Mr. Harris] it was 
decided that where a pardon had been granted 
upon condition that the party should perma- .- 
nently leave the country and he failed to go, or 
having gone, returned, he could be remanded 
into custody for the execution of the judgment 
and sentence of the court. Then if there be a 
political forfeiture in the crime of rebellion 
which has not been pardoned, the jurisdiction 
of Congress may properly attach and new or- 
ganizations provided for, in which the rebel 
element may be excluded. But even if the 
President's pardon be valid to make the of- 
fender a new man, civilly and politically, yet if 
he has violated the condition of the pardon the 
pardon becomes inoperative, and if a majority 
in the seceding States have violated it. are the 
rebel States not legally as they were before the 
attemjited restoration? * 

I have no feeling of malice whatever against ♦ ' 
the people of the southern States. I Mas born 
in the South myself, and ask nothing but what 
I think would be best for them and the entire 
country. My friend from Illinois [Mr. Trum- 
bull] seemed to think the other day that I was 
actuated by some new zeal, having been once 
a slaveholder. I said that I was a slaveholder 
at the beginning of this war. I am glad that 
the Senator is in his seat now. I was a slave- 
holder partly by inheritance. That I could not 
help, any more than the Senator from Illinois 
can help his disposition eternally to criticise me. 
[Laughter. ] He got his disposition by inherit- 
ance, and I received a slave by inheritance. I 
forgive him: will he forgive me? [3Ir. Trum- 
bull. Certfiinly.] I got them partly by pur- 
chase, not for purposes of profit, but at their ^i 
own request, to keep them from being sold to " 



others. I never got a dollar of their wages from 
the day I purchased them until the dny they 
■were emancipated. I paid from my hard earn- 
ings the money for their purchase and turned 
them loose, and they have received from that 
day to this the rewards of their own toil. 

I know that it is very easy to say, * ' You have 
been a slaveholder, and therefore a wicked 
man." Slaveholding is now, of course, un- 
popular. We must look to men's surround- 

. mgs in order to judge fairly of their acts. I 
:)ught not to speak of myself in connection 
with many who have been slaveholders, but I 
must be allowed to speak now, in my own de- 
fense, the simple truths of history. George 
Washington was a slaveholder, James Madison 
was a slaveholder, James Monroe was a slave- 
holder, Thomas Jefferson, the apostle of free- 
dom and the advocate at all times of emanci- 
pation, the man who looked down the long 

- vista of the then future and saw with prophetic 
ken the war of the last four years, was a slave- 
holder up to the day of his death. I do not 
know but I have sinned in being a slave-owner. 
If so, better men than I have sinned — not bet- 
ter than the Senator from Illinois, but better 
men than I have sinned, all over the South. 
The Senator from Illinois cannot realize the 

^(fact, perhaps, that if he had been in a slave 
State when slavery existed, he might have be- 
come a slaveholder himself, even against his 
will. A negro for whom he might have had 
regard, one who had been kind to him, is put 
upon the block for sale ; a purchaser is present 
to whom the slave is unwilling to be sold ; the 
slave begs him to buy. Would he not become 
a slaveholder under these circumstances if he 
had money enough to do it ? 

Mr. TRUMBULL. I hope my friend from 
Missouri did not understand me as saying that 
he had l^een a slaveholder, by way of reproach. 
Certainly, I meant no such thing. 

Mr.HJ3NDERS0N. I was afraid such might 
be the inference from the remarks of the Sena- 

. tor. 

'\ Mr. TRUMBULL. I did not so intend. 
Mr.HENDERSON. I am glad of it. I can say 
that so far as my former slaves are concerned, 
they will need no bounty from the Freed- 
men's Bureau. I have made some of them 
land-owners. My means are not large, but I 
have done something in the way of charity or 
justice, whichever it may be. To some I have 
given homes, and, if I live much longer enjoy- 
ing good health and my present vigor of con- 
stitution, I hope to be able to make them all 
land-holders. That is not all. Within the lim- 
ited sphere of my influence I have done some- 
thing toward purchasing churches and school- 
houses for the moral and intellectual culture, 
not only of the few formerly belonging to me, 
but of the many belonging to others. I have said 
to them, "Go and educate yourselves; pre- 
pare to become citizens of this country, as you 



must inevitably be in the future. ' ' If they be- 
come able to reimburse me, they will do so. 
If not, the loss is light, if this be sin, then 
have I sinned, and many slaveholders, how- 
ever odious now, have sinned likewise. For 
emancipation 1 have claimed no credit. If it 
be a great good, and I hope it is, others take 
the praise. But emancipation being an accom- 
plished fact, we cannot overlook the condition 
of near five million people, nor lightly scoff at 
their claims for civil and political rights. I 
said no more than this, and this simple fact, I 
thought, might be recognized by all. 1 atn 
glad to know, fur the sake of the honorable 
Senator himself, that he was not insensible to 
the importance of the question itself I can 
assure him that if my zeal be new, it is only 
because the circumstances themselves are new. 
At least, the zeal springs from no selfish aims of 
mine. If I consulted ambition alone, its ends 
might be better secured, perhaps, by bending 
the knee yet longer to a senseless prejudice. 

I have said to the people of my State, and 
now repeat, that when my present term expires 
I shall ask in the way of reelection, no indorse- 
ment of the past and no expression of confi- 
dence for the future. I might not obtain it, 
if I wanted it. Not desiring it, however, I can 
well afford to disregard all suggestions except 
those of duty. If I can see the Union restored 
in such manner as to assure the largest free- 
dom to the people, if I can see the principle 
find practical application in our Constitution 
and laws, that you cannot tax a man without 
representation, that you have no right to put 
the burden of the law upon him who has no 
voice in its passage, I shall be fully satisfied. 
I ask no honor beyond that of being instru- 
mental in accomplishing acts of justice in the 
discharge of duty. It is pleasant, to be sure, 
to be associated with gentlemen of such dis- 
tinguished abilities, and of patriotism no less 
distinguished, but yet one may well prefer the 
quiet of an humble home to the cares and re- 
sponsibilities which too often bring to the most 
conscientious incumbent of public position 
more of denunciation than of applause, more 
of misguided hatred than of deserved honor. 

But, at least, if honor comes from public life, 
it is bitter fruit, unless the conscience approve 
the deeds which 'bear it; it is an empty bubble 
unless posterity has reason to feel indebted to 
its possessor. 

But if the Senate will excuse me for this 
digression I will return to the subject. My 
object is not to devise ways and means to keep 
the revolted States away, but to find a safe 
bridge for their return. If they come back in 
the spirit of haughty defiance, with hands un- 
washed of their country's blood, with no work 
of penitence to commend them, with hearts 
yet filled with hatred, and without conviction 
of the enormity of their crimes, things will be 
made worse by their return. I have said things 



8 



are now bad enough. They should not be made 
worse. I am aware that some persons, many 
of them loyal and good men, ask the immedi- 
ate recognition of the new governments. It 
was to restore the Union, say they, that the 
war was waged. It was to bring these States 
back that the rich man gave his treasure, the 
poor man his mite, the wise man his thought, 
and the soldier his blood. Now, it is asked, 
why not restore it? 

^Ir. President, if the simple recognition by 
Congress and the admission of members now 
at our doors would restore the Union, Congress 
would not hesitate a moment. If I could speak 
the word of reunion, it should be spoken, but 
no controversy between the President and Con- 
gress will help the matter. That controversy 
may come. It cannot now come through the 
fault of Congress. The President in his an- 
nual message informed us what he had done 
in tlie premises, and then said : 

"Here it is for you, fellow-citizens of the Senate, 
and for you, fellow-citizen.s of the House of Kepre- 
sentatives, to judge, each of you, for yourselves, of 
the elections, returns, and qualifications of your own 
members." > 

If Congress, in the exercise of this admitted 
right, a right no better established because of 
the President's admission, believes that the or- 
ganizations from which these members come as 
Representatives are in disloyal hands, and that 
to receive the members would complicate our 
difficulties, can the President complain, ought 
the President complain, that we stop to inquire 
into facts ? The President has not told us that 
in his opinion the Legislature of a single recon- 
structed State is loyal. If he thinks so, why 
has he so often interfered with their legislation? 
Why is martial law continued in each one of 
them, when its existence depends on his will 
alone ? Why did he say to the Georgia conven- 
tion that Georgia should not pay a certain debt? 
Why to the North Carolina convention that the 
ordinance of secession must be declared null 
and void, and not simply repealed? And why, I 
ask, if these States are loyal and entitled to the 
dignity of States, does the President almost 
daily set aside, by the orders of military men, 
holding place at his will and discretion, the sol- 
emn acts of their Legislatures ? The President 
made it a condition that the reconstructed 
States should abolish slavery themselves, and 
adopt the constitutional amendment abolishing 
it iVirothers. Ilcthought hchad thepower, but 
whether he had it or not, he assumed and exer- 
cised it. But now that slavery is abolished, 
why are military officers throughout the South 
extending military protection to the negroes 
against the laws of the whites? They set aside 
entire codes of laws, and yet hold their places 
subject to executive approbation. 

i^ty purpose is not to condemn the Executive. 
All he has done may be necessary. I mean 
only to say, if these things are necessary, his 
plan of reconstruction is a failure, and Congress 



is not to be reproached for its short delay. If 
these organizations shall be recognized, is mar- 
tial law yet to prevail? Arc newspapers yet to 
be suppressed ? Are negroes yet to be protected 
by the bayonet? Will these States still reject 
the fact of freedom and deny the freedman the 
right to hold and enjoy property ? And if they 
so legislate, are judges and jurors and marshals 
who execute the State law, backed Ijy State 
militia, to be arrested and tried before Federal 
soldiers, under martial law, for offenses against 
national authority ? Will the President continue; , 
this work, and yet call these organizations inde- 
pendent and equal States of the American 
Union? Or does the President ask that Con- 
gress shall recognize the reconstruction, that he 
may be relieved of this unpleasant but neces- 
sary duty? For surely, these violations of the 
republican principle, in the late seceded States, 
would not be tolerated by the President if the 
conviction of overpowering necessity did not 
force him to commit them. But if the Presi- 
dent has been driven to these great things, 
which close the doors against the iidmission of 
his own theory, will not he or Congress have to 
continue them even after admission ? Congress 
ought to be excused from this work. 

If these organizations are loyal, why is not 
their legislation all on the side of lo3'alty? T'j ^ 
their legislation is right, why does the Presi-^, 
dent set it aside and have the military daily 
triumph over the civil power? If the organi- 
zations are disloyal, neither the President nor 
his friends should ask their recognition, much 
less should they denounce Congress for its refu- 
sal. For if disloyal, the President is certainly 
responsible for the fact. Congress is guiltless, 
for Congress has had nothing to do with it. 
The President acted without our advice. He 
might have acted worse if he had taken it. But 
whatever the responsibility, the honor, or shame 
of reconstruction, it is his. If disloyal organ- 
izations have resulted, I acquit the President of 
all design to bring about such result. But if 
he sees that such is the fact, no pride of opin- 
ion or false sense of humiliation should standJ>^ 
in the way of its acknowledgment. It will re- 
quire the wisdom of both the executive and 
legislative departments of the Government to 
give us peace. Let us have that wisdom com- 
bined. Let the President reject the counsels 
of false friends, and let Congress learn to trust 
his integrity. 

I have expressed no distrust of the Presi- 
dent's fidelity to principle. I express none be- 
cause I feel none. He felt it his duty to give civil 
government at once to the revolted States. 
That was the natural desire of every good man. 
He attempted it, l)ut has not yet removed mar- 
tial law from a single State. I do not blame 
him, for it is evide"t he cannot. He said his 
object was to '"en ' le the loyal people of the 
State to restore the State to its constitutional 
relations to the Federal Government, and to 



9 



present such a republican form of government 
as will entitle the State to the guarantee and 
protection of the United States." Did he put 
the power in loyal hands, and if so, have they 
presented such a form of government as he 
desired? If they have done so, military law 
should wither and die, and the civil power of 
those States is too sacred a thing to be touched 
by the rude hand of the soldier. 

The misfortune is, that, however sanguine the 
^President in his hopes of securing a loyal basis, 
he failed. He had snatched from the shoulder 
of the disloyalist the deadly musket, and vainly 
thought that acts of unmerited generosity in 
the moment of his defeat would molt his stub- 
born heart to repentance. The pardon was so 
sudden, and made so general, that its motive 
seems to have been misapprehended. There 
may have l^een, there probably was, a tempo- 
rary feeling of gratitude in the first moment of 
helpless confusion, but it was soon thought to be 
more of a favor to the victor than to the A'an- 
quished. For a short time it may have been 
asked in suppliant spirit. It was soon de- 
manded as a right. The musket, it is true, was 
gone ; but that which was even far more potent 
in their hands had been substituted. The mus- 
ket had been seized to perpetuate slavery. The 
'musket could not save it. The ballot had once 
done so. The ballot might yet save the sub- 
stance and traditions of slavery, though the 
musket could not save its form. For all this 
I have said Congress is not responsible. The 
President selected his own classes for pardon 
and for exception. He put his own construc- 
tion on the act of Congress, and assumed that 
pardon for treason gave back the ballot to the 
y traitor. 

After issuing the amnesty proclamation ho 
proceeded, as I have said, to issue another on 
the same day providing for the reorganization of 
North Carolina, which was followed bj' a procla- 
mation of a similar character for each one of the 
seceded States, leaving out Louisiana, Tennes- 
-'vee and Arkansas, which had been reorgan- 
ized under Mr. Lincoln. 

The first part of it declares it to be the duty 
of the United States to see that each State has 
a republican form of government, and then 
proceeds : 

"Now, therefore, in obedience to tlie hisrh andsol- 
— emn fluties imposed upon me by the Constitution of 
the United States, and for the purpose of enabling 
the loyal people of said State to ort^anizeaStategrov- 
ernment, whereby justice may be established, domes- 
tic tranquillity insured, and loyal citizens protected 
in all their rights of life, liberty, and property, I, 
Andrew Johnson, President of the United States, and 
Commander-in-Chief of the Army and Navy of the 
United States, do hereby appoint William W. Holden 
provisional governor of the State of North Carolina, 
whose duty it shall be, at the earliest practicable 
period, to prescribe such rules and regulations as may 
be necessary and proper for convening a convention, 
composed of delegates to be chosen by that portion of 
the people of said State who are loyal to the United 
States, and no others, for the purpose of altering or 
amending the constitution thereof; and with author- 



ity to exercise, within the limits of said State, ,all the 
powers necessary and proper to enable sucli loyal 
people of the State of North Carolina to restore said 
State to its constitutional relations to the Federal 
Government, and present such republican form of 
Stat^ government aswillcntitletheStatc to thcguar- 
antco of the United States therefor, and its i)eople to 
protection by the United States against invasion, in- 
surrection, and domestic violence." 

That is all well enough ; I have no objection 
to it; but what comes next? 

"Provide'/, That in any election th.at may bo here- 
after held for choosing delegates to .any Stnto con- 
vention as aforesaid, no person shall bo riualiticd aa 
an elector, or shall be eligible as a member of such 
convention, unless he shall have i)reviously taken and 
subscribed the oath of amnesty, as set fortli in the 
President's prnc!ani:ition of Mny 2!'. A. D. ISOo. and is 
a voter QualiliiMl and pri'scribid by the constitution 
and laws of the Statu ol North Ctirolina, in force im- 
mediately Ijelore the 2Uth day ot :\lay, 18(jl, thedateof 
theso-called ordinaneeof secession ; and thesaidcon- 
vention, when convened; or the Legislature thnt may 
be thereafter assembled, will prescribe the Qualitica- 
tion of electors, and the eligibility of persons to liold 
otfice under the constitution and laws of the State — 
a power the people of the several States comi>osing 
the Federal Union have rightfully exercised from the 
origin of the Government to the present time." 

It will be observed that in the former portion 
of the extract I have read, the proclamation of 
the President confines the reorganization of 
the State, in words, to the loyal men of North 
Carolina — such I am satisfied was the Presi- 
dent's intention ; but under the proviso, in my 
judgment, he commits the error. He says that 
everybody is a voter, who will take the amnesty 
oath, and who was a voter under the constitu- 
tion as it existed May 20, 18G1, the day of 
secession. The conquered rebel who saw the 
musket fall from his hands, however criminal 
with the blood of his fellow-men, had only to 
acknowledge the futility of further efforts in 
armed rebellion. No matter what his past 
deeds, they were pardoned, and the assumption 
made that such pardon was sufficient again to 
clothe him with the ballqt, that sacred right of 
an American citizen. He was not required to 
say that State law, or even considerations of 
personal safety, liad induced him to wage a 
bloody and relentless war against his country. 
Although he had voted for secession and will- 
ingly given his treasure and influence to fur- 
ther the cause, though he had brought terror 
upon unwilling neighbors and driven them from 
the support of a slandered and injured Guvern- 
ment, or compelled them to take refuge in 
mountain caverns, while their property was 
seized and turned into the cofl'ers of treason, 
that man coujd vote on a simple pledge for the 
future, regardless of the past. 

The faithful negro, for whose degradatiori and 
misery these deeds of blood have been done, 
was again forgotten. The State constitution, 
made by his owners while he was a slave, of 
course denied him the suffrage. I have not 
complained of the President that the negro v/as 
denied the suffrage. Ihave not compK'ned of 
anything. I do not now complain, much less 
do I design to censure. But it seems to me 



10 



that if the State constitutions of Mississippi and 
Texas must be barriers in the way of negro suf- 
frage, those other clauses denying suffrage to 
any but '• citizens of the United States" should 
have presented barriers against the whitefcien, 
who had abjured allegiance to our Government, 
sworn allegiance to a hostile de facto govern- 
nu'ut, and for four years had staked their lives 
npon the success of the one and the total over- 
throw of the other. After these deeds they 
may be citizens of the United States ; but if 
so, I know not how the right of citizenship may 
be forfeited. The President' s pardon may have 
restored the right of citizenship, if lost. That 
may have been the President's view. If so, I 
have already expressed my dissent. The Pres- 
ident's pardon went to the life and property, 
relieved the penalty named in the act giving 
him the power to offer amnesty, but went no 
further. If citizenship is forfeited. Congress 
alone can restore it. It is a political right, 'be- 
longing to the legislative authority of the coun- 
try, and which the Executive can neither give 
nor take away. 

But, now, giving the pardon its full force, 
has it not been forfeited, and is Congress not 
justified in assuming a forfeiture, at least so far 
as it may be necessary to secure the guarantee 
of truly republican forms of government? 

So far as the life and property of the rebels 
are concerned, I do not ask that anything be 
abated from presidential pardon. Their blood 
I do not want. The cause of the country does 
not demand it. Humanity, indeed, shrinks 
back from the thought of justice. Justice now 
would be cruelty, in the eyes of history. Lives 
enough have been taken. Malice and revenge 
may claim many piore. National policy rejects 
the claim. The war itself has confiscated 
enough. Confiscation will give our coffers noth- 
ing. It may gratify personal avarice, but this 
is a poor return for loss of national honor. For 
me, the rebels are welcome to life and property. 
I would not add one to the tears that moisten 
the cheeks of sorrow. I would so make our 
Government, however, that the heaviest penalty 
for treason would be the traitor's remorse. To 
dry up one tear, we are told, brings larger fame 
than to shed oceans of blood. But while I 
would extend mercy to the conquered rebel in 
my power, I must remember the simple dic- 
.tates of justice in behalf of him who pleads for 
mercy, and pleads in vain at the hands of that 
rebel. That generosity, which ceases to flow 
beyond the limits of our own race, is partial and 
unworthy of man. While I would forgive the 
rebel, I wcuild elevate him whom the rebel has 
oppressed for ages. I would teach each man 
to abandon his prejudices and seek his own 
happiness in the haiipiness of his fellow-men, 
where alone he can find it. 

For many long years, indeed from the origin 
of our history as a nation, slavery and its inci- 
dents have constituted the weapons of political 



wai'fare. Party power, the lust of office, the 
whisperings of ambition, the hopes of individ- 
ual preferment, the ties of political association, 
too often united with the promptings of avarice, 
conspired to uphold the institution. The same 
considerations, with many on the other side, it 
is too true, may have added to the intensity of 
the struggle ; but chiefly the abuses of slavery 
on the one side, feeding, as it were, on increase 
of appetite, and the strong moral conviction of 
its injustice on the other, its wrong to the blacr / 
and its injury to the white race, urged our peo- 
ple on to the gigantic struggle now just closed. 
But is it closed? The boom of the cannon is 
not heard, the crash of musketry has ceased, 
and the saber has been returned to its scabbard, 
but the nation seems yet in doubt. The air is 
tainted with suspicion that all is not right. The 
war was waged by rebels that injustice might 
yet live. Within the Union it was thought it 
could not live ; hence it would go beyond the 
nation' s jurisdiction. Justice is strong because 
it is the weapon of Omnipotence. Slavery in 
form has died. Let it die now, in fact and in 
truth, and the national life is assured. It was 
a feeling of conscious right that gave us suc- 
cess in the recent struggle. Now that success 
has come, we propose again to reject the truth, , 
to turn our faces in shame from an honest con-* 
viction and barter once more eternal justice 
for expediency. 

The President undertook to reconstruct on 
the white basis. The negro is again forgotten. 
A few negroes voted in the reorganization of 
Louisiana under Mr. Lincoln, and last March, 
every Democrat in Congress voted against ad- 
mitting her Representatives under that organi- 
zation. The other States are now reorganized, ^ 
under what we are told is the same plan, and 
every Democrat here now clamors for imme- 
diate admission. Why is this? Is it because 
the negro has been excluded or because the for- 
mer rebel has voted? Our Democratic friends 
here certainly have no interest in common with 
rebellion, and hence their present enthusiastijl^ 
support, of what they call the President' s recon- 
struction policy, must spring from the fact that 
the negro has been excluded. They see, in this, 
a white man' s Government. The President hav- 
ing excluded him in the first work of reorganiza- 
tion, his hopes are, perhaps, gone forever. If 
loyal Avhites only had been admitted by the 
President to the ballot-box, those who opposed 
secession until treason had overwhelmed them, 
they perhaps would have constructed the organic 
law of those States in such manner as to leave 
hope for the negro's enfranchisement hereafter. 
But who expected to find favor for the black 
man from the returning soldiers of Lee and 
Johnston's armies? With the political power 
in the hands of such men, the future is easily 
divined. 

Do not understand me. Mi'. President, as 
complaining that the negro was not permitted 



11 



to vote. I only urge that his right was at least 
equal to that of rebels. If rebels must vote, 
the uegro ought to vote also. I will make no 
offensive comparisons ; but to those men who 
have carried mourning into every household in 
the land, who rejected all counsel and heed- 
lessly rushed on to the country's ruin, who must 
be remembered in the long future when pov- 
erty parts with its hard earnings to pay the pub- 
lic debt, who would murder a whole section to 
secure the privilege of robbing a race, I owe 
nothing. The loyal Democrats owe them noth- 
ing. My friend from Indiana, [Mr. Hexdricks,] 
who sits before me, and whom they defeated for 
Governor of Indiana in I860, owes them noth- 
ing — except mercy, and with him I go to grant 
them mercy. Let him go with me for justice 
in behalf of others. 

I know it is often said that unless pardoned 
rebels could vote, the President would have had 
no white basis or population to reconstruct upon. 
This, Mr. President, is a mistake. Thousands 
were forced into active measures against the 
Government. Many loyal men in the begin- 
ning, I know, afterward becam_e disloyal, but 
had an oath been prescribed l)y the President 
for white voters, formerly qualified under their 
respective State constitutions, which would have 
excluded the active and willing disloyalist, who 
not only went into i-ebellion himself, but forced 
his neighbor in, we would now have organiza- 
tions of a different character in the southern 
States, and such as would have given the Pres- 
ident but little trouble. It may not be that such 
governments as would suit every man in Con- 
gress, or even a majority, would have resulted 
From any system whatever, but I contend that 
a more loyal basis might have been secured 
among the whites. 

The white population of the eleven seceding 
States in 1860 was 5,449,4(33, the free colored 
population was 132,760, and the slave popula- 
tion was 3,521,110, making a total population 
of 9,103,338, three fifths being white and two 
fifths colored. I look now to the vote of 1860 
•for President. Of course I cannot give the 
vote of South Carolina, because the presiden- 
tial electors in that State have always been 
chosen by the Legislature. But in the other 
States the vote for Mr. Breckinridge was 416, 592, 
the vote for Mr. Bell 345,919, and the vote for 
Mr. Douglas 57,723, making an entire vote of 
820,234. He who lived in the slaveholding 
States at the beginning of this rebellion knows 
perfectly well that those who voted for Bell and 
those who voted for Douglas were LTnion men. 

I know it perfectly well. There is not a Sen- 
ator within the hearing of my voice, who lives 
in a border State, that does not at once recog- 
nize the fact. Four hundred and sixteen thou- 
sand men in the South then voted for Mr. Breck- 
inridge, and 403,000 of them voted for Bell and 
Douglas. Then nearly half the people of those 
States were Union men. 



An oath reaching the past conduct of these 
men, a j^ardon, if you please, on the condition 
that the active^ blatant rebel of 1860 and 1861 
should refrain from participating in amending 
that which he wished to destroy, and which he 
would now as gladly destroy as ever, would have 
given us liberal reorganization, institutions of 
vitality, filled with the spirit of the age, devoid 
of prejudice, and opening up the brightest hopes 
for the melioration of the poor, whether white 
or black. 

But we have to take things as they are. The 
President has acted, and his governments are 
before us. I asked him during the progress of 
reconstruction but one thing, and that was, if 
he reconstructed on the rebel vote to recon- 
struct on the negro vote also. It may have 
been wront; to do so, but if he had included it, 
his governments may have worked more har- 
moniously than they do. This is all I ever 
asked, all I now ask. There is nothing that I 
crave for self or friends at the hands of mortal 
man. So much, 1 thought, could be demanded 
of justice, so much be craved in the mercy of 
God. [Applause in the galleries.] 

The PRESIDING OFFICER, (Mr. Foot in 
the chair.) Order! 

Mr. HENDERSON. But if the active rebel 
vote had been excluded, I was willing to respect 
the constitutions of those States as they existed 
before the rebellion, and trust to Union men to 
so fix the franchise — and they would have done 
so— as to secure fidelity to the LTnion and peace 
to themselves. If to secure these ends the negro 
vote had become essential, it would have been 
granted. The Senate tvill pardon me if I refer 
to some remarks made by me at the last session 
of Congress on this subject of reconstruction. 
I read from volume two. Congressional Globe, 
second session, Thirty-Eighth Congress, page 
1070 i 

" When citizens of a State rebel and take up arms 
against the General Government they lose their rights 
as citizens of the United States, and they necessarily 
forfeit those rights and franchises in their respective 
States which depend on United States citizenship," 

The Senator from Massachusetts [Mr. Sum- 
ner] interrupted me during the speech, and in 
reply to a question put by him, I said : 

"I have already explained my positions on these 
subjects. I am in favor of the loyal men g-overniug the 
State. If that be the government of the few, it results 
from the voluntary disloyalty of the many. They, of 
their own will, relinquish the right to govern them- 
selves under the Constitution, and as they have no 
legal right to gavern otherwise they cannot govern at 
all. I can nomorecompelthemtogovern themselves 
according to the Constitution than I can compel a loyal 
man to vote who refuses to do so. As to the oligarchy 
of skin or color, I can tell the Senator again that the 
question of suffrage is with the States. If they confer 
the franchise on the negro, I surely do not object. 

"Mr. President, Isay that the only way to crush out 
disloyalty and bring back peace in this country is to 
let theloyalmen of the seceded States form Stategov- 
ernments, and let us uphold them. That is the means 
upon which we must sooner or later rely to reestablish 
peace and restore union." 

I do not think that it is necessary to the re- 



12 



publican principle that tlie majority, althougli 
rebels, should govern, and therefore I took issue 
with the distinguished Senator from Ohio [Mr. 
Wadk] at the last session. If a majority of the 
people of a State become disloyal, why cannot 
the minority rule? 

I want State governments, indeed they must 
exist or the national Government is incomplete. 
Without a State Legislature no State can be 
represented in this body. Without a Governor 
or Legislature no State can ask for protection 
against domestic violence. But if a majority 
of qualified voters in a State are disloyal and 
are resolved to overthrow the national Govern- 
ment, you must destroy their power for mis- 
chief. Do you destroy their power by leaving 
them in possession of the State government, 
where they may levy taxes on the loyal men and 
use their money in waging war? You do not 
deny the right of the nation to expel from 
office, the State officials, whom these men have 
put in power to accomplish the objects of their 
treason. You do not deny the right of the na- 
tion to shoot and kill this majority when it op- 
poses your power. You do not hesitate to step 
in with military power to protect the loyal mi- 
nority against this majority. You admit the 
power to remedy. Then why is there no power 
to prevent ? We have been told that * ' an ounce 
of prevention is better than a pound of cure." 
Our Constitution, it seems, is made on no such 
idea. 

Mr. WADE. Will the Senator permit me to 
ask him a question ? 

Mr. HENDERSON. Certainly; I am seek- 
ing light. 

Mr. WADE. How, practically, can one tenth 
of the peo23le of a State rule that State on re- 
publican principles ? 

Mr. HENDERSON. I am not speaking about 
the theoretical idea of republicanism. I am 
speaking of republicanism accoi'ding to the Con- 
stitution of the United States, and 1 know of no 
other republicanism in a legal point of view ; 
that is, in all my conduct here I must be guided 
by that Constitution. lamsworntobesoguided. 
If a majority in a State, opposed to the Federal 
Government, have a right to rule, they can se- 
cede legally. I admit the theory that all men 
should vote in the State if it can be carried out. 
But even on the subject of republicanism in a 
State does the Senator not know that for a 
number of years, the majority of the people of 
South Carolina have been slayes, who had 
no part, lot, or share in the Government? Does 
he not know that a majority of the people of 
South Carolina and Mississippi — I mean the 
slaves — were always debarred of any right in 
the Government, either national or State? I 
am considering the Constitution as it is, not as 
he and I would have it. 

Mr. WADE. I said upon republican princi- 
ples, not aristocratical principles, for I know that 
one man couldgovernaState on those principles. 



Mr. HENDERSON. South Carolina was one 
of the original thirteen. Let me ask the Sen- 
ator if South Carolina had not a republican con- 
stitution, in the eye of the supreme law, the 
Constitution of the United States ? 

Mr. WADE. No ; she never had. 

Mr. HENDERSON. Then was there an 
error in the understanding of our forefathers ; 
they certainly must have deceived themselves 
when they made the instrument. 

Mr. WADE. They were mistaken. ,, 

Mr. HENDERSON. Thatmaybe. Our fore- '/ 
fathers may have made many mistakes. I have 
no doubt they did. One of them I would cor- 
rect, and that is what we are considering. They 
made a mistake in leaving slavery to exist at 
all. But they did leave it, and it brought war. 
I think if we leave wrong to fester, again, some- 
time in the future, we shall have another war. 

Mr. WADE. J am with you there. 

Mr. HENDERSON. I hope you will be with 
me in many things. But all this is outside of 
the question. I submit to the Senator, have the 
disloyal men in a State the right to govern, if 
they are in a majority? 

Mr. WADF. In my judgment they have not. 

Mr. HENDERSON. Then have not the loyal 
minority the right to erect a State government? 

Mr. WADE. My opinion is that where only ^ 
one tenth of the population of any State are 
loyal, that that State is in such a condition that 
it cannot govern itself upon republican princi- 
ples. 

Mr. HENDERSON. Suppose there are five 
hundred only, less than half in the State of Ten- 
nessee or the State of North Carolina, who are 
loyal ; will the Senator govern that State for 
all time by military authority as a province of 
the Government of the United States leather 
than let the loyal minority make a State gov- 
ernment for themselves ? If we were to do that, 
we might pervert and overturn our whole re- 
publican system. We cannot afford to keep 
large standing armies for such a purpose, unless 
we intend to destroy our own liberties. Then 
let us permit the loyal minority to govern. In • 
Missouri one third, if not more, of our entire 
population, has been disfranchised by the new 
constitution of the State, and some say that a 
majority have been disfranchised by it if en- 
forced. Will he turn away Missouri from rep- 
resentation here, if it be ascertained that a ma- 
jority of her people are disfranchised? The 
people have voted on it and have made it the 
law of the State ; and any man who cannot take 
the oath prescribed in it, of course cannot vote ; 
and if it should turn out that a majority of the 
people have been disfranchised, the Senator 
trom Ohio must drive me from the Senate 
because Missouri is not a republican State. 

Mr. WADE. I apprehend that the rebels 
will try to drive you out. 

Mr. HENDERSON. It is the duty of the 
Government of the United States to recognize 



13 



the loyal people of a State ; 1^ them form a 
constitution, and when that i? done, admit them 
here, and when you have admitted thorn, pro- 
tect them, if necessary, by the military authority 
of the country. Did you not protect Rhode 
Island a few years ago in the very same way ? 
There is no doubt that a majority of the people 
of Rhode Island were in favor of the Dorr gov- 
ernment. Nobody doubted it, and yet this 
Government maintained the minority there, 
' ])ecause it was the established government. 
Mr. FESSENDEN. Let me ask the Senator 
whether a military force would not be necessary 
in order to protect and sustain the government 
of a minority? 

Mr. HENDERSON. I have felt the diffi- 
culty that the Senator presents : I have thought 
of this question much ; I might answer him by 
saying that when a majority are disloyal and the 
minority are without State government, you 
need a much larger army. For all then is an- 
archy. If you have a State government, you 
have civil rules at least, and machinery to dis- 
pense justice. Hence you have order. If in 
the one case you have to use an army, in the 
other your army may be smaller, because the 
civil power gives its assistance. Again, the 
State may soon furnish its own police. It is 
much better for the people of each State to have 
their own police than for us to send an army 
among them. Military power is dangerous in 
peace. If it has to be used let it be in aid of 
law. If the rebel majority make the law you 
cannot aid it, and you have not only to over- 
throw the State law, but you must enforce an 
adverse policy. That, too, must be done by 
courts-martial and not by courts-civil. That is 
the very difficulty the President now has with 
his new organizations. They are not animated 
by the spirit of the loyal minority, but by the 
rebel majority. This is the mistake, and the 
great mistake. 

The country wants the Union restored. Many 

food mbn are astonished everywhere that the 
Representatives are not admitted. The Pres- 
"v'dent committed himself to his plan of recon- 
struction, and his pride demands that he should 
succeed. The country is greatly indebted to 
the President for the much he has done in se- 
curing, at least, outward manifestations of loy- 
alty by the people of the South. It will be 
remembered that almost every act of conven- 
tion or Legislature, overthrowing the traditions 
and heresies of treason, have been secured by 
the direct interference of the President. The 
abolishment of slavery, the adoption of the 
constitutional amendment, the repudiation of 
the rebel debt, nullifying the ordinances of se- 
cession, and giving civil rights to thefrcedmen, 
may all be traced to that interference. If none 
but loyal men had been i-eprosented in those 
conventions, these and many other proper 
things might have been done without that dic- 
tation by the President, which upsets the entire 



theory of his plan. The President has entire 
confidence in these organizations, because, per- 
haps, the,y have done all he asked them to do, 
and promise to do more if he demands it. He 
does not ask them to give suffrage to the negro, 
and although it is and ever will be against their 
own interest to deny it, yet, as they have ever 
done, they consult prejudice rather than right 
or interest, and promise all except that. They 
would give that, if tlie President had asked it. 
But he was personally, perhaps, opposed to it, 
and at once the Constitution rose up in his way, 
and though he could attach any condition to 
pardon, and require other things in the judg- 
ment of some men much worse, though he could 
dictate other measures and did dictate, yet this 
would be a dangerous usurpation of power. If 
three and a half million men were disfranchised 
and robbed of all political power, there was no 
usurpation in that, no tyranny, no danger to 
the re^^ublican principle. 

Some members of Congress are afraid that 
these organizations are a kind of Grecian horse ; 
that they are full of armed men, and when once 
in the citadel they may rush forth and open the 
gates to the returning Democracy. Whether 
there are any armed men in them or not, the 
Democrats think so, and they demand imme- 
diate recognition. They have stimulated the 
President's pride, and he interprets these very 
reasonable fears of his friends as a reflection 
upon his loyalty and integrity. All that now 
exists between the President and Congress 
comes from this simple statement. The Pres- 
ident is willing to trust them now. Congress 
asks time to look in and see if there is any dan- 
ger. The President admits that Congress has 
a right to do so, but those who opposed his elec- 
tion and who liave opposed his policy up to this 
moment tell him that this is an attack on his 
Administration. 

Finally, the Senator from Massachusetts, [Mr. 
Sumner,] always doing some imprudent thing, 
I cannot always be near him to tell him better, 
[laughter, ] makes his whitewashing speech, and 
then the President sees a consj^iracy against his 
policy. Parties are busy attempting to widen 
the breach, and on last Saturday a deputation 
comes up from the Virginia Legislature bring- 
ing to the President resolutions of that body, 
indorsing his reconstruction policy, but saying 
nothing about fealty to the Constitution or loy- 
alty to the Government. Mr. Baldwin, the 
spokesman of the delegation, in presenting the 
resolutions, said : 

"The people of Virginia and their representatives 
accept the result and abide by the consequences of 
the late contest." 

"Accept" and "abide by!" "Chief among 
the results," he said — 

" is the universal conviction that the Union of thwe 
States is an established fact. We recognize this Gov- 
ernment as our Government, its Constitution and the 
rights which it promises as our rights." 



14 



It was their Government in 18G1. Tlie Con- 
stitution, save and excepting slavery, was then 
as it now is, and the rights it secured are no 
more sacred than in 1861, when the Gosport 
navy-yard was destroyed and Harper's Ferry 
was surrendered to rebel soldiers. If those 
rights are more sacred, it is simply because the 
negro is now entitled to freedom. But Mr. 
Baldwin says, further: 

"Another great result is the final overthrow of sla- 
very. This has been concluded by constitutional 
amendment. The General Assembly of the State of 
Virginiais engaged earnestly in consideration of these 
subjects, and wc can only say that whatever policy 
may be adopted will be for the moral culture and im- 
provement of the condition of the freedmen; and to 
treat them with harshness and injustice is against our 
feelings." 

Mr. Baldwin says that great results have 
flowed from the war, and one of the greatest is 
the overthrow of slaverj'. Virginia accepts this 
result and recognizes the Government as her 
Government, and the Constitution thus changed 
as her Constitution. We are here assured that 
Virginia has gone to work to secure the "moral 
culture"' of the negro and to "improve" his 
condition. If this be so, it is a little strange 
that General Terry interferes by military order 
to set aside a solemn act of that Legislature, 
designed, as he says, to sell all the negroes into 
slavery again under the pretext of vagrancy. 
But if the Virginia Legislature, in the process 
of reorganization, can busy itself in matters per- 
taining to the moral culture of the negro and 
the improvement of his condition as a citizen 
of the country, why is it that the national Le- 
gislature, through which, against the bloody 
protest of Virginia, the negro has become free, 
cannot aid and assist the reconstructed Virginia 
Legislature, in this humane and commendable 
work, without l)eing held up all over the coun- 
try as radicals, Jacobins, and Red Republicans ? 
If Mr. Baldwin can accept the freedom of the 
slave, why cannot he accept that which will keep 
him free ? I say nothing of the antecedents of 
Mr. Baldwin and those who came with him. 

Mr. WILSON. Allow me to ask the Senator 
if this Mr. Baldwin is the Mr. Baldwin who was 
a member of the confederate congress. 

Mr. HENDERSON. I think so. Of course 
it is the same. 

Mr. WILSON. I should like to know if it 
is the same Mr. Baldwin who nominated Gen- 
eral Lee the other day, as the next Governor of 
that State, in the Virginia Legislature. 

Mr. HENDERSON. The same man, Ithink. 

Mr. SUMNER. And he has been addressing 
the President of the United States ! 

Mr. HENDERSON. I do not object to his 
addressing the President of the United States. 
That is not my complaint. Senators run ahead 
of me and break up the connection of my 
thought. I cannot think so much as others, nor 
so fast. I was going to say that my objection 
consists not in the appearance of Mr. Baldwin 



and his associates. I would have them come, 
and come often. I like to hear expressions in 
favor of the Constitution as it now is. I like 
to be assured of a returning sense of loyalty. 
Congress only asks to be assured of the sincer- 
ity of the professions. The President seems 
to be satisfied. He commenced, however, with 
the work of reconstruction last May. Congress 
commenced only in December. When Con- 
gress shall have been engaged at the work as^ 
long as the President, it may be equally satii/ 
tied. One should scarcely be upbraided for a 
want of belief in any proposition, unless he has 
neglected the opportunities for information. 
Conviction in the human mind comes from the 
evidences adduced. Before we believe any 
proposition, and especially such a proposition 
as the sudden conversion of the people of the 
seceded States to unaffected and sincere loy- 
alty, we should be excused for demanding the 
proofs necessary to establish it. I complain 
that the President himself being satisfied takes 
it for granted that Congress ought to be satis- 
fied, and in reply to Mr. Baldwin uses some 
expressions that tend to no good. There is no 
use of controversy between the Executive and 
Congress. I profess to be, and am a friend of 
the President's, and shall use no language, even i 
in expressing differences with him, that maj^ 
tend to excite the country against him. His 
language in this reply will be interpreted as an 
attack upon certain members of Congress, at 
the least, and possibly upon Congress itself, 
should a difference hereafter spring up between 
them. 

He says, in effect, that one rebellion has been 
put down against the southern men, and now 
he intends, if necessary, to put down a rebel- 
lion against somebody else. Of course I am 
not included in this new conspiracy or rebel- 
lion. My friend from Kentucky, [Mr. Guth- 
rie,] the other day, in a moment of excitement, 
almost threatened the dissolution of the Union 
again. This is not oil on the troubled waters. 
The President says, in his reply to the Virginiji^, 
delegation, as follows: 

"The Government, in the assertion of its powers, 
and in the maintenance of the principles of the Con- 
stitution, has taken hold of one extreme, and with the 
strong arm of ])hysical power has put down the rebel- 
lion. Now, as we swing around the circle of the Union 
with a fixed and unalterable determination to stand 
h^M, if wctind the counterpart or the duplicate of 
the same spirit that played to this feeling and these 
persons in the South, this other extreme which stands 
in the way must get out of it, and the Government 
must stand unshaken and unmoved on its basis. The 
Government must be preserved." 

The Senator can now understand. 

Mr. SUMNER. What is the meaning of 
that? I do not understand it. 

Mr. HENDERSON. I do not know that I 
understand it, but if I do, it means the rebels 
and the radicals have played see-saw, and he 
intends to stop it. That is the whole of it. I 
want to be plain. I will read the former sen- 



15 



tence, however, and then jDcrhaps the Senator 
can understand it for himself. The President 
says: 

" I do not intend to ?ay anythinpr personal, but you 
know as well as I do that at tho beginning, and, in- 
deed, before the beginning of tho recent gigantic 
struggle between the different sections of the coun- 
try, there were extreme men South, and there were 
extreme men North." 

The Senator is one of the extremest I ever 
knew ; but the President proceeds : 

"I might make use of a homely figure (which is 
sometimes as good as any other, even in tho illustra- 
tion of great and important questions) and say that it 
has been hammer at one end of tho line and anvil at 
the other; and this great Government, the best the 
world ever saw, was kept upon the anvil and ham- 
mered before therebcllion, and ithas been hammered 
since the rebellion; and there seems to be a disposi- 
tion to continue the hammering until the Go vernment 
shall bedestroy ed. I have opposed that system always, 
and I oppose it now." 

The Senator will now understand that he is 
hammering at the other end of the line, and he 
may get hammered soon. [Laughter.] 

Mr. SUMNER. I do not understand any 
such thing. 

Mr. HENDERSON._ The Senator is slow 
to understand. I hope it comes from conscious 
innocence. But, Mr. President, to be serious. 
I deprecate this language, it tends to no good. 
It comes, I fear, more from feeling than from 
judgment formed on a proper consideration of 
the case. Great interests are at stake, and they 
who now wield the power of this nation, both 
in the executive and legislative departments, 
have a grave responsibility on their shoulders. 
If mistakes werejieretofore made in the organi- 
zation of the Government, now is the time to 
correct them. Our forefathers were wise men, 
perhaps the wisest that any age has given us. 
No one doubts their integrity, their unselfish 
devotion to true republican principles. If they 
had carried out their own repeatedly expressed 
convictions on the subject of slavery, this war 
of the rebellion would not have come. We all 
know that considerations of an early union, the 
necessity for protection against foreign Powers, 
as well as the supposed immediate demands of 
trade and commerce, added to an indisposition 
or absolute fear to grapple with the avarice and 
prejudice connected with slavery, induced them 
in the formation of the Government to ignore 
the condition of the African slave. 

They mournfully contented themselves with 
keeping the word "slave" out of the Consti- 
tution. They scorned to sanction, by direct 
words, its existence, but yet provided, under 
another name, that the nation's power should 
, be used to mend, when broken, the chain of 
human bondage. They excused themselves 
and the Government they made, by putting the 
responsibility on the States. They hoped, in- 
deed they expressed the hope, that the States 
would soon emancipate, and they framed a 
Constitution admirably suited to that condition 



of things. Slavery was inconsistent with the 
very principle on which they built. To save 
the pain of cutting, they consented to leave one 
fiber of the cancer, hoping that nature would 
soon heal it. Nature did not heal it, but the 
cancer grew from year to year until the whole 
body-politic became diseased. The last five 
years have been spent in a grand surgical op- 
eration to save the life of the patient. The 
cancer has been cut to its roots. The patient 
is suffering, but he is stronger than when the 
operation commenced. Who is the timid sur- 
geon that would now hesitate to remove the 
last particle of disease? If there be one, that 
man will be responsible hereafter for much 
suffering. Some say, leave it with the States : 
they will cure themselves. The State govern- 
ments are a necessary part of the national Gov- 
ernment. The President tells us one cannot 
exist without the other. They are the limbs of 
the human body. Would you partially remove 
disease from the arm and then tell the arm to 
cure itself? Would you half cure the heel and 
foolishly trust to nature for the balance simply 
because the heel is so far from the seat of life ? 
A limb sick, makes the body sick, and he who 
would preserve health and vitality must ward 
off disease at every point. 

I have been led to these remarks by looking 
at the present condition of the southern States. 
Is there no symptom of disease there? All 
over the country Congress is denounced be- 
cause it does not accept the President's healing 
or restoration of those States as a perfect cure. 
Is the old disease eradicated? If so. Congress 
ought to admit their Representatives, and it 
deserves the denunciation of the country in 
default of speedy action. Does the President 
himself believe that the cure is pertiict? If we 
admit them they must henceforth he treated as 
loyal States. We must give them the exercise 
of all local and municipal power not granted to 
Congress. In that case we should at once re- 
move martial law. The privilege of the writ of 
habeas corpus should be restored. It is now 
suspended by the will of the President. When 
once admitted, thecondition of thefreedmanand 
the poor white, must be left to them. The suf- 
frage cannot then be changed without their free 
consent, uninfluenced by any considerations. If 
admitted, and they are strong enough to repu- 
diate the public debt, withdraw the pensions 
from the wounded veterans, or deny the claim 
of loyal States for expenses and loyal men for 
damages, the country must accept it, and ac- 
cept it in peace. I do not fear many of these 
things, but the President himself seems to fear 
much. If hfe is satisfied with these organiza- 
tions, why does he not treat them better? 

During the session of the Georgia convention 
Mr. Seward telegraphed to the provisional gov- 
ernor, as follows : 

" Your several telegrams have been received. The 
President of the United States cannot recognize the 



16 



the people of any State havinp resumed relations of 
loyalty to the Union that admits as lepral obligations 
contracted or debts created in that name to promote 
the war of the rebellion. 

"WM. II. SEWARD." 

Why? Was not Georgia an independent State? 
The President said it was. Did not Georgia 
h.ave a right to assume and pay any debts she 
pleased? What right had Air. Seward to tele- 
graph to the convention of Georgia that Geor- 
gia should not pay a debt? And yet my Demo- 
cratic friends say the President's policy must 
be sustained. What policy ? Is it the policy 
of letting the President do as he pleases, reor- 
ganize a State government, and wherever it 
runs counter to his views to stop it in its legis- 
lation afid say, " Thus far shall thou go and no 
further. ' ' But if Congress undertakes to inter- 
fere, not interfere, but hesitate, to sanction these 
asperfect and legitimate Sta'te governments, they 
are a set of Jacobins, ' ' French revolutionists, ' ' 
"dangerous men," who ought to be turned out 
at the point of the bayonet. The President 
calls it ' ' hammering at the other end of the 
Hne." 

The State of Tennessee has been reorganized. 
How reorganized ? The President himself was 
the beginner and the originator of it, as the mili- 
tary governor of Mr. Lincoln. The Tennessee 
members are here seeking admission. But the 
Presiderft has put General Thomas at Nashville. 
The Senator from Illinois [Mr. Trdmbull] the 
other day presented his proposition here, put- 
ting judicial powers in the hands of the military, 
for certain purposes in the seceding States. It 
was to protect negroes, when discriminated 
against in their civil rights, by State legislation 
in those States. The press all over the country 
opposed to these so-called Jacobins announced 
the fact that the Senator from Illinois, the great 
leader of the new revolution, had introduced 
a most dangerous proposition, carrying military 
men down .South to usui-p the entire political 
power of the revolted States and to administer 
mock justice at the point of the bayonet. I did 
not like it myself. I am afraid of even the ap- 
pearance of military rule. But let us go on 
with the case of Tennessee. The President 
usurps these powers, I should say uses them, 
and the President is right, but the Jacobins are 
wrong. Will you tell me the difference ? Is 
not General Thomas put in command in Ten- 
nessee by the President himself? Yes. Is he 
not kept there by the President? Yes. Did 
not General Thomas under the President's or- 
ders arrest a bishop of the diocese of Alabama, 
the other day, and imprison him? Some said 
it was only because the bishop would not pray 
for the President. And yet General Thomas 
is not dismissed. But suppose Congress should 
undertake to interfere with the worship of tlie 
Christian religion down South, what would be 
said about it? Let me read an order issued by 
General Thomas a few days ago. It is a letter 



addressed to Messrs. Guild & Smith, at'^orneys- 
at-law, at Nashville : 

Headquarters Division of the Tennessee, 
Nashville, Tenn., Jnniianj 17, 1866. 

SiEs: It has been reported to Major General Thomaa 
that you, as counsel for one John Allen, of Smith 
county, have instituted suit against James S. Bur- 
ham, of Sumner county, late captain first Tennessee 
mounted iulantry, for rent for the said Allen's farm 
while the said farm was under the control of the 
United States as abandoned property. 

This is clearly a violation of General Orders, No. 
29, from these headquarters, often published in the^ t 
newspapers of the State, and must have been seen by'/ 
you. lie directs me to say to you that you will at 
once cause said suit to be discontinued and dismissed 
forever, failing in which you, John Allen, and the 
circuit court clerk of Sumner county will be arrested 
and brought to trial before a military commission. 

By command of Major General Thomas : 

R. W. JOHNSON, 
Brevet Brigadier General, U. S, A, 
Messrs. Guild & Smith, Attorney s-at-law. 

Mr. HENDRICKS. How do you like it? 
Mr. HENDERSON. No, the proper ques- 
tion is, how do you like it ? Why, Mr. Presi- 
dent, if this is not hammering on one end of 
the line, or the middle of the line, I do not 
know what it is. These attorneys bring a suit 
under a State law, and the military otiicer in 
chief command, under the direction of the 
President, announces in a letter to them that 
they will be arrested and imprisoned and tried 'r 
before a military commission if they go on with 
the suit; the clerk of the court is notified that if 
he issues process he will be seized. Of course 
the letter does not include the judge, because 
the judge cannot take cognizance or jurisdic- 
tion of the case until the writ of summons has 
been returned ; but if the clerk should happen 
to issue process, and it should be served, I 
suppose General Thomas would go further, and 
if the judge should undertake to render judg- 
ment in the case, the judge himself would be 
seized and hammered, under the judgment of 
a military court. 

Mr. President, I have said this whole sup- 
posed controversy between the President and 
Congress is perfectly ridiculous to me. Why 
is the country convulsed from one end to the /- 
other now about the return of these States? 
Did they not go out voluntarily ? Did we not 
beg them to stay? Was not the life of every 
man in this land endangered by their conduct? 
Have they not given us untold sorrows and 
afflictions in defiance of almost base entreaty 
and much gratuitous, but scorned advice? I 
told them these difhculties would come. They 
went. And now, because I do not vote them 
back the very moment they present themselves 
— before the President himself will abide by 
their laws, indeed while he feels bound daily 
to set them aside — I am a Jacobin, a leveller, 
a maniac on the subject of negro rights. Some 
of these gentlemen around me may be danger- 
ous men ; I do not know but they are ; I am 
not. I claim to be conservative. I have al- 
ways been conservative. If entitled to the 



17 



designation of radical at all, it must be a con- 
servative radical. Nov/, sir, here is General 
Terry, of Fort Fisher notoriety 

Mr. WADE. Fame. 

Mr. HENDERSON. I beg pardon, it is 
fame, and not notoriety. What does he say in 
regard to a law of the State of Virginia? He 
is in command at Richmond. Was he not put 
there by the President of the United States, and 
can he not be removed by him to-day? Cer- 
tainly. What has he done? Tlie State of Vir- 
ginia a short time ago passed a vagrant act. 
Here is a general order issued by General 
Terry, dated Richmond, January 24, 1866 : 

"By astatiife passed at the present gossion of the 
Lofishiture o!' Viri'inia, entitled 'A bill providing 
for tlio punishmout of vagrants,' it is enacted, among 
other thing?, that any justice of the peace, upon the 
complaint of any of certain officers therein named, 
may issue his warrant for the apprehension of any 
person alleged to be a vagrant and causesueh iierson 
to be api>rchendcd and brought before him; andthat 
if upon due examination said.iustice of the peace shall 
find that such person is a vagrant within the defini- 
tion of vagrancy contained in said statute, he shall 
issue his warrant directing such person to be employed 
for a term not exceeding three months, and by any 
constable of the county wherein the prooeedings are 
had be hired out for the best wages which can be 

grocured. his wages to be applied to the support of 
imself and his family," &c. 

This act applies to white people too. The 
Senator from Illinois will notice that it does not 
apply to the negro alone ; it applies to all per- 
sons ; and yet General Terry says that it is 
made a mere pretense for selling negroes into 
slavery, and his order concludes as follows : 

" It is therofore ordered that no magistrate, civil 
officer, or other person shall in any way or manner 
apply or attempt to apply the provisions of said stat- 
ute to any colored person in this department." 

They may sell white men, since this order, into 
slavery and the negroes may buy them, but Gen- 
eral Terry says they shall not sell a negro into 
slavery ; the white people may soon tind them- 
selves sold out in the Old Dominion to the blacks 
and the sale enforced Ijy military law, and yet 
the President sustains all this. The President 
placed General Terry there and may remove 
him or overrule his orders. The President sus- 
tains him, however. But because we hesitate 
to regard the State of Virginia as fully reor- 
ganized, and now devotedly attached to the 
Union and resolved to sustain the Constitution 
directly m the teeth of these acts, the President 
strongly thinks we are "hammering atone end 
of the line." t 

Mr. SUMNER. Allow me to ask my friend if 
the President did not probably refer to the Dem- 
ocrats as hammering at the other end of the line. 

Mr. HENDERSON. My impression is from 
all 1;he circumstances surrounding the case, that 
the Senator from Massachusetts is one of the 
men alluded to. I think I can say to him as 
Nathan said unto David, "Thou art the man." 
[Laughter.] The Senator certainly did make 
an imprudent speech when the report on the con- 
dition of the southern States came in. The 



President should know that the Senator from 
Massachusetts makes many imprudent speeches. 
It is utterly impossible to keep him straiglit un- 
less some more conservative man, like myself, 
can whisper him right. [Laughter.] If I could 
have reached him in time, I am satisfied, he 
would never have used the term "white wash- 
ing." [Laughter.] I am fearful the President 
attaches too much importance to this impru- 
dent speech. We pay no attention to it here. 

Again, has not General Sickles issued an 
order at Charleston, with twenty-three sections, 
making up an entire civil code for the govern- 
ment of South Carolina, the Legislature being 
in session? 

Mr. WILSON. The most comprehensive 
ever made. 

Mr. HENDERSON. Certainly, taking al- 
most the entire government of South Carolina 
under military control and military power. The 
President can do this thing — I say the Presi- 
dent, because Generals Terry, Sickles, and 
Thomas, and all these men act through the 
President only — the President of the United 
States can do all these things, and Congress, 
cannot help him. Congress never saw business 
of this sort going on, that it did not want a hand 
in it, and I think we have a right to have some 
hand in it. The President admitted the right, 
and he is now estopped from denying it. 

General Grant issued an order, some time 
ago, right here in the city of AVashington, im- 
mediately under the President's eye, and he 
certainly must have known all about it, which 
is general, and applies to all the eleven seceded 
States. It is as follows : 

[General Orders, No. 3.] 

War Department, •» 

Adjutant General's Office, 
Washington, January 12, 1866. 

To protect persons against improper civil suits and 
penalties in late rebellious States: 

Military division and department commanders, 
whose commands embrace or are composed of any of 
the late rebellious States, and who have not already 
done so, will at once issue and enforce orders protect- 
ing from prosecution or suits in the State or muni- 
cipal courts of such State, all officers and soldiers of 
the armies ofthe United States, and all persons thereto 
attached, or in anywise thereto belonging, subject to 
military authority, charged with offenses for acts done 
in their military capacity, or pursuant to orders from 
proper military authority : and to protect from suit 
or i)rosecutiou all loyal citizens, or persons charged 
with offenses done against the rebel forces, directly 
or indirectly, during the existence of the rebellion; 
and all persons, their agents and employes, charged 
with the occupancy of abandoned lands or planta- 
tions, orthe possession orcustody of any kind of prop- 
erty whatever, who occupied, used, possessed, or con- 
trolled the same pursuant to the order of the Presi- 
dent, or any of the civil or military departments of 
the Government, and to protect them from any pen- 
alties or damages that may have been or may be pro- 
nounced or adjudged in said courts in any of such 
cases; and also protecting colore.l persons from pros- 
ecutions in any of said States charged with offenses 
for which white persons are not prosecuted or pun- 
ished in the same manner and degree. 

By command of Lieutenant General Grant: 

E. D. TOWNSEND, 
AnsiMant Adjutant General. 



>r^it^*.\ 



18 



That order is substantially the bill of the hon- 
orable Senator from Illinois, the. bill that this 
Congress has passed, called the Freedincn's 
J3ureau bill, and which it is understood all over 
the country the President will veto. Why veto ? 
Did not General (xraut issue this order with the 
con.sentof the President of the United States? 
Can there be any doubt about it? 

Now. sir. is jiot all this controversy perfectly 
ridiculous? It seems to me so. But for its 
serious importance, the apparent earnestness 
of persons and parties in this maze of incon- 
sistency and palpable contradiction would be 
amusing. 

Mr. HENDRICKS. If the Senator will allow 
me, I should like to ask him one question : 
whether he reads these orders of the military 
commanders for the purpose of approving them, 
or for the purpose of condemning them, or 
simplv for the information of the Senate? 

iMr." HENDERSON. I do not know that the 
Senator has any right to catechise me as to the 
purpose with which I read a paper to the Sen- 
ate. But he certainly cannot misunderstand 
my object. 

Mr. HENDRICKS. I disclaim the right; 
but when so able a Senator is addressing the 
body, of course we would like to know what 
he means by the evidences that he brings be- 
fore us. 

Mr. HENDERSON. The Senator address- 
ing the body is not so able, but it is a little 
strange he has not already indicated to the ever 
quick and ready mind of the Senator from In- 
diana what his purpose is. Certainly he has dis- 
played no ability whatever if he has failed to 
make himself understood by that Senator. I 
^haveno objection, however, to making the state- 
ment in answer to the question so plain, " that 
he may run, thatreadeth it." 

The idea has gone abroad, and it is most care- 
fully urged, that Congress has resolved to gov- 
ern the southern States as provinces, that the 
committee of fifteen was organized to carry out 
this purpose. The party that opjjosed Mr. J ohn- 
son's election take this opportunity to announce 
their devotion to the Union, and clamor for im- 
mediate restoration. Of course military rule 
is denounced. This is a strong card. I dis- 
like military law as much as any man. The 
whole country dislikes it. Even the soldier, 
reared under our institutions, who enforces it, 
dislikes it. Congress is arraigned for taxing the 
southern people without representation. This 
is another powerful argument, an argument that 
could not be answered, if the very organizations 
now presenting themselves did not propose to 
tax half their people, for all time to come, with- 
out any voice or representation now, and with- 
out hope of it in the future. 

Again, we are charged with being disunion- 
ists. We are so designated in the columns of 
leading papers. And why is it? The people 
are taught to believe that harmony and peace 



and good-will reign supreme in the southern 
States; that they have loyal governments or- 
ganized, administering justice without delay, 
sale, or denial, and protecting all their inhabit- 
ants ; that the spirit of rebellion is far removed 
from them, and thej' only need an opportunity 
now to show their old i)roverbial love and at- 
tachment for the Union. The war was waged 
for the Union, and the people long to see it 
restored. This natural desire is seized upon to 
array hostility to Congress. The President is 
praised ; his reconstruction policy indorsed in 
the strongest terms. Lincoln's reconstruction 
policy, in form the same, but ditfering only in 
that it brought Union men to Congress and 
secured another State to the Union in case of 
confederate success, was denounced by the same 
men. Congress is arraigned for the Freedmen' s 
Bureau bill. I do not like it myself, and only 
supported it as a means of getting what is right. 
I had nothing to do with the committee of fif- 
teen, and I hold now that the House of Repre- 
sentatives cannot control my vote, against my 
will, in the admission of a Senator from one 
of the seceding Staes. No law of Congress can 
control it. The States are in the Union, but 
in the Prevsident's view they are not yet out of 
rebellion. The Attorney General says they are 
not, and the President treats them worse than 
provinces. If the reljellion is over and the cause 
of it removed, why these proceedings which I 
have enumerated? 

Mr. President, I think I have shown that the 
Executive is estopped from complaining of Con- 
gress. Political parties cannot consistently ap- 
plaud the President and then say one word 
against Congress. Does the President design 
continuing this military rule after the Repre- 
sentatives are admitted? If necessary now, 
will it be less so after admission ? My friend 
from Indiana, however, with all his instincts 
against these things is no doubt ready to join in 
the general cry and say, great is the President 
and accursed be the Jacobins. v 

Mr. HENDRICKS. I have not said that. 

Mr. HENDERSON. I am glad of it. Many 
others have said it and do now daily say it. 

Mr. HENDRICKS. My position with re- 
spect to the President of the United States is 
just this : I am not under that sort of obliga- 
tion which is known as party obligation. I 
expect to indorse and approve in his conduct 
everything that my judgment and conscience 
approve. The Senator would not ask me to 
do less, and I think he would not ask me to do 
more. 

Mr. HENDERSON. Certainlv not. 

Mr. HENDRICKS. My modesty wotld 
prevent my appearing before this body as the 
peculiar champion of the President. I did 
not help to make him President ; Init what is 
right in his Administration I shall support, 
and I think I may say now that perhaps ] 
will find something in his conduct to approve 



19 



whicli some of the Senators about me may 
disapprove. 

Mr. HENDERSON. I was aware of the 
modest}' of my friend. [Laughter.]. And I am 
aware of another thing ; I am aware of his dis- 
tinguished ability and his sagacity in seizing 
upon anything, anything fair and legitimate, of 
course, that may l^e necessary to build up the 
^ party with which he thinks the best interests 
) of tiie country are connected. His modesty 
will also prevent his telling us whether he 
approves these acts of the President or not. 

Mr. President, I now repeat mj' regrets that 
the President has seen fit to exact at the hands 
of Congress a strict compliance with his policy' 
on the subject of reconstruction. I say com- 
pliance, for I cannot interpret his speech to the 
Virginia delegation in any other way. I regret 
it, becaiTse this is no time for party excitement. 
The best interests of this great country cannot 
now be safely connected with party success. 
To solve our difliculties needs true patriotism, 
and true patriotism is too often choked out 
by the rank selfishness of party politics. 

Mr. ^VILSON. _ Will the Senator allow me 
to ask him a question? 

Mr. HENDERSON. Certainly. 

Mr. WILSON. I want to ask him, as he is 
giving his opinions pretty freely, if he has any 
anxiety whatever in regard to the opinions of 
this Mr. Baldwin, or any man of that class, or 
any men in the country who sjmipathize with 
them, that they will be able to influence affairs 
iu any of the States that in 18fJ4 voted for ]Mr. 
Lincoln for President. I ask him if he does 
not believe that those States, bj' a most deci- 
sive majority, a majority larger than they gave 
in 1864, are to-day opposed to the admission of 
any of the States that have been in rel:)ellion 
into these Chambers until they are so adjusted 
as to give proper security for the future? 

Mr. HENDERSON. I have answered so 
many questions that I have scarcely been able 
to keep the true question in view. Injustice 
and wrong often triumph. Our only consola- 
tion is, that such triumphs cannot be perma- 
nent. I do not know how far the people will 
be deceived, nor how long the deception will 
last. The Union must be restored and this 
Congress must do it. It must be cemented in 
the everlasting principles of justice, but I want 
it cemented immediately. 

Mr. WILSON. So do L 

Mr. HENDERSON. We cannot stand still. 
Work is to be done, and if we do not go for- 
ward we shall fall back. It is a crisis in our 
affairs, and a crisis as important as that of 186L 
I am not mistaken in what I say. The rebel- 
lion is now suppressed. The rebels are rest- 
less and discontented. Some loyal men have 
become frightened at what they term the dan- 
gerous extremes of radicalism, and, after having 
been the most radical of all radicals, they are 
ready to fly to the arms of rebels and seek 



safety in their conservatism. It is an epoch in 
our hi'tory from whicli will date new political 
organizations. New schemes of personal am- 
bition will soon be developed. The pride of 
our military chieftains will be appealed to, and 
cunning plans laid to secure their favor. This 
period is similar to that in English history, 
when Charles I became a prisoner in the hands 
of those who fought for the rights of man against 
the unlimited prerogative of the Crown. It is 
the condition of France when Louis XVI was 
a prisoner, and the combined enemies of the 
republic had melted away in the blaze of re- 
publican ardor. Let us avoid the excesses of 
the conquerors in those cases, but let us be 
firm in securing the legitimate results of the 
victory. Those results may be known to all 
who know the causes of the war. The war was 
another contest of prerogative with inalienable 
right, an effort to perpetuate privileges of the 
few, at the expense of tlietoil and tears of mil- 
lions. It was to sanctify, by human law, what 
was condemned in the law of God. It was, in 
fine, to ignore the very existence of millions of 
people in the government and laws of a coun- 
tiy, that claims the highest civilization, the 
largest freedom and the broadest charity for 
mankind. 

In the judgment of Congress these danger- 
ous and anti-republican notions have again 
crept into and are likely to be conserved in the 
new organizations, and Congress will likely de- 
mand that they be eradicated before admission. 
It is quite certain that Congress is not satisfied 
with the present condition of things, and if We 
determine not to accept them, the decision 
should be made at once. 

Some say we cannot go behind the action of 
the President. He has pardoned the rebels, 
and that pardon restored them to all the rights 
of citizenshiij, and among those rights is the 
right to vote. As the Constitution now stands, 
the regulation of the franchise belongs to the 
States. But surely Congress has entire control 
over the question of United States citizen- 
ship. Congress may make a citizen of the Uni- 
ted States. It made many, by joint resolution, 
in the admission of Texas. Congress made 
citizens of the Stockbridge and other Indians 
by law, and recently it has declared, by bill 
already passed, the entire African race to be 
citizens of the United States. It seems to me 
that this power exists in Congress, as a great 
political right, irrespective of the crime of re- 
bellion or other offertse committed by the citi- 
zen himself. If this lie true, then Congress 
may provide for an enrollment of all its citizens 
in the seceded States, and require an oath, or 
proof if you please, of original loyalty in any 
form to be prescribed, and iu default of such 
oath or proof, or both, if thought necessary, 
the party so neglecting or refusing might be 
declared decitizenized. If this can be done 
much difficulty may be avoided, for Congress 



20 



may at once provide for the erection of State 
governments in those States by the loyal me'n 
only. In this way the entire question of negro 
suflrage may be avoided. As those State gov- 
ernments existed at the date of secession, the 
negro could not vote, but at the same time, it 
was likewise provided, in nearly all of them, 
that none but citizens of the United States 
should vote. For instance, the constitution of 
Mississippi is in the following words : 

" Every free white male person of the age of twenty- 
cue years or upward, who t;hall be a citizen of the 
United States, and shall have resided in this State 
one year next preceding an election, and the last four 
months within the county, city, or town, in which he 
olJers to vote shall be deemed a qualified elector." 

Under the constitution of Texas, ' ' every free 
male person who shall have attained the age of 
twenty-one years, and who shall be a citizen 
of the United States, &c., (Indians not taxed 
and Africans and the descendants of Africans 
excepted,") .shall be entitled to vote. The 
constitution of Arkansas provides that — 

"Every free white male citizen of the United 
States who shall have attained the age of twenty- 
one years,"' &c. 

Shall vote. The qualifications in Florida, Ala- 
bama, Tennessee, and Louisiana are the same. 
The right has been exercised, I know, but ma}' 
be seriously questioned, whether any but citizens 
of the United States may properly be permitted 
to vote in any State. But however that may 
be, the constitutions to which I have referred 
required this test for the elector ; and if Con- 
gress can take away citizenship, the State has 
already taken away suffrage, and reconstruc- 
tion on the basis of purel}' loyal men, few or 
many, white or black, will give State govern- 
ments, with which the President would iind no 
cause, in my judgment, to interfere by military 
power. 

The usual answer to the exercise of this 
power by Congress is that it is an ex jjont facto 
law, and therefore prohibited by the Constitu- 
tion, which declares that — 

" No bill of attainder or ex poet facto law shall be 
passed." 

But is it in any sense an ex post facto law ? 

Mr. HENDRICKS. Yts. it is. 

Mr. HENDERSON. The Senator says it is. 
An ex pod facAo law is one that prescribes a 
punishment, for the commission or doing of an 
act, to which no penalty or forfcitui'C was at- 
tached at the time of doing it, or which increases 
the punishment after the commission of the 
offense. The question which I aimed to put, 
is, can Congress, in the exercise of its power for 
the safetyof the nation, the preservation of the 
l)ublic welfare, take away the rights of citizen- 
ship for any cause whatever? We have before 
us a question now, the decision of which will 
involve the solution of this. Congress hereto- 
fore gave the right of sullrage to the people of 
this District in their own municipal govern- 
ment. Can Congress pass an act to take away 



that right of suffrage and put the city or Dis- 
trict government here in the hands of a board 
of commissioners, to be appointed by the Pres- 
ident or by Congress ? 

^ Mr. HENDIUCKS. The Constitution of the 
United States places the government of the Dis- 
trict of Columbia entirely under the control of 
Congress, and therefore we may do for the Dis- 
trict of Columbia, I presume, whatever a legis- 
lative bq^y may properly do for the people un- 
der its jurisdiction. But, with the permission 
of the Sen.ator, I wish to suggest further, that 
if the President of the United States, as we all 
know he has done, has pardoned a very large 
portion of the people of the South upon a con- 
aition with which they have complied, they then, 
in my judgment, so far as the penalty of the law 
stands, are free from its penalties, and that to 
take avv'ay the right of citizenship is a penalty 
which we cannot impose as a punishment after 
the President has pardoned the parties. 

Mr. HENDERSON. The Senator persists 
in misunderstanding me. , I am not speaking 
now of crimes, nor the effect of the pardon. 1 
have answered many questions, and, perhaps, 
not very satisfactorily. The Senator will per- 
mit me to ask him one question, as it may con- 
vey to him the best possible answer to the ques- 
tion he has asked me. In the State of Indiana, 
to-day, the uneducated are entitled to the right 
of suffrage. Does the Senator believe that a 
constitutional convention of the State of In- 
diana, if now in session, could deprive every 
man in that State who cannot read and write 
of the right of su^rage ? 

Mr. HENDRICKS. I have no doubt that 
the constitution of the State might be so amended 
as to limit the right of suffrage according to tlie 
pleasure of the convention, if that action .should 
be approved by the people. But, sir, the ques- 
tion I suggested to the Senator was this: can 
you, aftcF an act is done, impose a penalty not 
known to the law at the time the act was done? 
Can we, according to the sentiments which gov- 
ern legislative bodies in these modern times, 
enact an ex post facto law, and punish a party 
for an act done in a manner not provided for 
by the law at the time the act was done, and 
especially after the President, or any other 
party having the power to pardon, has exer- 
cised that ]iower. 

Mr. HENDERSON. The Senator will re- 
member the Federal Constitution provides that 
no State '• shall pass any bill of attainder, ex 
post facto law, or law impairing the obliga- 
tions of contracts." He says that the State of 
Indiana may pass such a law, and it will not be 
subject to the objection that it is ex jjost facto. 
How, then, is it that a similar act passed by 
Congress conflicts with a ])rovision in the same 
words? The limitation is no stronger upon 
Congress than upon the States. The Senator 
might deny that th(^ power claimed is a dele- 
gated power, but his admission estops him from 



21 



calling such a law an ex post facto law. But I 
will discuss this subject no further. T refer to 
it as a way or means of k'^gally securing loyal 
governments, provided the present organiza- 
tions in the seceding States be rejected by Con- 
gress. 

Mr. CLARK. If the Senator from Missouri 
will pardon me one moment, 1 wish to ask the 
Senator from Indiana a question. 
' Mr. HENDRICKS. I do not care a-bout 
being drawn into this debate. 

Mr. CLARK. I do not wish to draw the 
Senator from Indiana into the debate, but I 
desire to put this question : whether, if a State 
finds it is necessary for its own protection — not 
for the punishment of rebels, but to guard itself, 
and for its own protection — may it not exclude 
these men from voting ? Would that be an ex 
post facto law ? 

Mr. HENDRICKS._ That is not the ques- 
tion that I was discussing with the Senator from 
Missouri. I have no doubt of the entire con- 
trol of the States over the question of the right 
of suffrage, and it may be exei-cised according 
to the pleasure of the State. The Senator from 
Missoui-i is advocating now, as a punishment 
upon the pardoned rebels, the withdrawal of 
the right and character of citizenship. As a 
penalty, as a punishment, I do not think it can 
be imposed after the President has pardoned. 

Mr. HENDERSON. The Senator assigns 
me a position, the least defensible he can find, 
and then makes his attack. I try to explain, 
but he will not accept the explanation. 1 have 
not disputed, and for purposes of the argument 
I will not dispute, that the pardon of the Pres- 
ident relieves these parties of the penalties of 
their crimes, provided the conditions of the 
pardon have been kept ; but this is a separate 
and distinct question. I asked the Senator, 
even had there been no rebellion, if it is within 
the jurisdiction of Congress to pass an act de- 
claring that any portion of the inhabitants of 
the United Stiites are no longer citizens of the 
United States ? Is this a political power that 
the body politic enjoy for their own protection 
and for their own purposes ? That is the ques- 
tion. If the State of Indiana has the perfect 
right to enfranchise or disfranchise any portion 
of its population, is it not within the jurisdic- 
tion and competency of Congress to declare 
that certain parties are no longer citizens of 
the United States, even if there never had been 
any rebellion ? 

The honorable Senator from Indiana, instead 
of answering the question as put both by my- 
self and by the Senator from New Hampshire, 
refers with apparent pleasure to the fact that 
the pardon having been exercised by the Presi- 
dent, the rebels are made i^ew men, that not 
only penalties are removed, but privileges, if 
ever lost, are fully restored. I am not disposed 
to be technical in the premises, but if 1 were, 
it strikes me that the conduct of the President 



toward these organizations, since their estab- 
lishment, furnishes strong evidence of the exist- 
ence of a fact at the time of granting the pardon 
which would render it void. At the common 
law, to render a p;irdon valid, it must express 
with accuracy the crime intended to be forgiven. 
Hence, in the case of the United States vs. 
Steller, decided in the United States circuit 
court at Philadelphia, the court say that gen- 
eral pardons are not granted by the Crown but 
by Parliament, and that though our constitu- 
tion may possibly confer the right, yet the right, 
if it exists, has never been exercised. In that 
case, the defendant had been indicted for ' 'coun- 
terfeiting and uttering counterfeit coin," and 
there was a general verdict of guilty. In the 
President's certificate of pardon it was recited 
that the defendant had been convicted of coun- 
terfeiting, and thereupon a full and unconditional 
pardon was granted. The court refused to ex- 
tend the pardon beyond its express terms, and 
hence the party was left subject to the disabili- 
ties imposed by the conviction and sentence. 
Another principle necessarily resulting from 
this was, that whenever it may be reasonably 
supposed that the King, when he grants a par- 
don, is not fully apprised of thoheinousnessor 
wickedness of the crime, or that he has been 
imposed upon by c'oncealment or false repre- 
sentations of the party to be benefited, the 
imrdon is void. But a more familiar principle 
sSll is the one previously alluded to, that if a 
pardon be granted on conditions and the con- 
ditions be not complied with the pardon is void. 

It may be that the President was fully advised 
of the character and extent of the crimes of the 
rebels when he issued his proclamation. It may 
be that no imposition was practiced on him to 
secure the amnesty, but if it be so. it surely can- 
not be that they have kept the conditions of the 
pardon, at least the President cannot think so. 
The pardon was general, and included the en- 
tire community with certain exceptions. Those 
exceptions could not participate in reorganiza- 
tion. The community jiardoned did participate. 
In ascertaining whether there has been a com- 
pliance with the conditions, we must not, we 
cannot, look to isolated or individual cases. We 
must look to the community, the body-politic, 
and hold all responsible for the action of that 
pardoned community. The condition was that 
the pardoned, that is, the masses, with certain- 
named exceptions, should " faithfully support 
all laws and proclamations which have been 
made during the existing rebellion with refer- 
ence to the emancipation of slaves." 

Nobody doubts now that freedom is legally se- 
cured to the negro, and nobody d-oubts that full 
civil rights attach to that condition, yet Missis- 
sippi has passed a law denying the right of the 
negro to hold real or personal property. The 
same is true, I believe, of South Carolina, and 
hence the order of General Sickles, to which I 
have referred. The President himself, through 



24 



He discovered that in 1860 the entire popu- 
lation of California was 379,994, and that out 
of that number, 273,337 wore males and only 
10C),t)o7 were females. He discovered, also, 
that Illinois had 808,941 white males and only 
805,350 females, an excess of 93,591, enough 
to give Illinois an additional member of Con- 
gress under the contemplated rule. He dis- 
covered also that Louisiana had an excess of 
males over females of 22.000, Kansas 11,000, 
Iowa 34,000, Indiana 48,000, Missouri 03,000, 
and other western and southwestern States in 
like proportion, while Connecticut, New Hamp- 
shire, New York, Rhode Island, Massachusetts, 
and the Atlantic States generally have a large 
excess of females over males. Hence while 
this rule might coerce the southern States to 
adopt negro suffrage, it would at the same time 
weaken the representative power of the East ; 
in other words, while it might coerce the South 
to admit negro suffrage, it might drive the North 
and the East to woman suffrage, for which they 
■were not prepared. The very moment Mr. 
Bl.vine made some figures on this subject and 
laid them before the House of Representatives, 
that proposition was dead forever. Perhaps it 
ought to have died. But if so, it should have 
died of another reason. You cannot enfran- 
chise everybody in the States, and it may be 
asked with great power, why should not the 
civil, instead of the political society, be repre- 
sented In Congress? 

Mr. SHERMAN. What was the date of that 
speech ? 

Mr. HENDERSON. Sometime in the early 
])art of January, the precise date I do not re- 
member. The figures I use are taken from the 
census, and I may not state the objections just as 
Mr. Blaixe stated them. I do substantially, for I 
happened to hear his remarks against the meas- 
ure which had the approbation of many west- 
ern members, and which yet is thought by them 
to be the best. The real objection to it in my 
mind consists in cheapening the franchise to 
obtain political power. 

As I have said, however, the proposition died 
so soon as it was found that the East was to 
lose by it. I do not blame these Eastern gen- 
tlemen. They want the privilege to exclude 
their women and minors from the suffrage, yet 
they want them counted in the basis of repre- 
sentation in the Federal Government. At least, 
they object to any jienalty being imposed on 
them for their exclusion. But 1 hasten on. Some- 
thing was to be done. The negro must he en- 
fi'.'inchised, but the difficulty consisted in choos- 
ing words that would place the penalty for 
denying suffrage on the South, and yet let the 
North i),nd East deny it with impuuily. The 
next dilliculfy was to select words, that would 
act as a penalty on the South, without incur- 
ring the prejudice against negro suffrage in the 
North and East. Mr. I^laink finally obtained 
the happy words, and these hajjpy words are 



now embodied in the proposition of the com- 
mittee, which I have read. 

The first inquiry of t^e country will be, what 
object is contemplated by this amendment ? 
What is to be effected? After six or seven 
thousand million dollars have been expended, 
after mourning has been brought to almost 
every house in the land, after blood enough has 
been spilled to float our heaviest monitors, after 
the deepest interest has fixed itself in the pub- i, ' 
lie heart and intense anxiety is depicted on 
every face, it is simply contemptible to trifle 
with the sad earnestness of an intelligent peo- 
ple by the use of ambiguous language. They 
have a right to know our meaning, the purport 

of our measures, and they will be satisfied with 

nothing less. This resolution is now before us, 
and many earnest Union men think it must bf> 
adopted — that its defeat will be attended with 
great danger to the best interests of the coun- 
try. Hence, many will not stop to inquire what 
results may flow from it. I read it again : 

Representatives shall be apportioned anions; the 
several States which may be included within this 
Union according to their respective numbers, count- 
ing the whole number of persons in each State, ex- 
cluding Indians not taxed: Provided, That wlicnever 
the elective franchise shall be denied or abridged in 
any State on account of race or color, all persons ,| 
therein of such race or color shall be excluded from 
the basis of representation. 

It will be observed that after the word ' ' Rep- 
resentatives," the first word in the resolution, 
the committee have seen fit to drop the three 
words which follow in the text of the Consti- 
tution as it now stands, to wit, "and direct 
taxes." So if the amendment should pass, 
representation may be fixed on one basis and 
direct taxation on another. So jealous were 
our forefathers on this subject that they never 
thought for a moment of separating taxation 
and representation. In their judgment, such 
separation was tyranny. It was so declared 
throughout the revolutionar}' struggle, and at 
the time of the adoption of the Constitution a 
proposition like this, under which, a people / , 
paying full taxes, should have but half repre- 
sentation, would have received no favor what- 
ever. A direct tax would operate harshly 
against my State. It is a tax levied in pro- 
portion to the numbers of the people. The 
people in the newly settled States are gener- 
^ly poor, and a tax on each person of an equal 
amount may be paid easily by the rkh men of 
the old settled States, while it woula drive to 
poverty the people of the new. if the rich 
States of the Atlantic sea-board, now having 
the power in consequence of the wicked ab- 
sence and rebellion of the South, should be 
able to adopt a basis of representation under 
which they could pay the public dcljt by direct 
taxation, the West and South might be impov- 
erished, while the people of New England and 
the middle "States would grow yet richer. 

I shall watch rebel influence and keep It out 
of the ebuncils of the nation. The North will 



25 



be forced to join me in this, but in foolish fear 
of rebel influence I will not consent to run into 
this danger. My State is as much interested in 
this proposition, as the East is in having their 
women and minors represented in Congress. 
The loyal men of the South, robbed of their 
substance by rebel tyranny, will join Missouri 
loyalists in having this great del)t paid, as far 
as possible, from the wealth of the country, and 
not wrung almost entirely from the sweat of 
^Tjoor men. The poor men go from the East to the 
vXVest. The rich stay where they can enjoy the 
comforts of an older civilization. I see no reason 
to run in base fear from anti-negro aristocratic 
rebel influence into the hands of a moneyed 
aristocracy. But whence comes this eternal 
specter of rebel power, in Congress, to frighten 

-" us from all propriety ? I thought we had deter- 
mined to reject all rebel organizations in the 
southern States, and to tolerate and recognize 
none but loyal Governments. If we do so, 
where is this rebel specter? It is, like many 
other ghosts, used for a purpose. I am not 
afraid of such ghosts. The people of this coun- 
tiy will never suffer any but loyal men to gov- 
ern these southern States, and the sooner, the 
disloyal there know it, the better for them. I 
know they may give us trouble, and a great 
//deal of it. But the loyal men will possess the 
country at all times. If I am right, then, this 
proposition is not so efficient, as a means of 
weakening rebel influences, as to place, in the 
hands of the more wealthy States the power, to 
tax unjustly the loyal and disloyal white and 
black of the poorer States South and West. I 
acquit gentlemen, of course, of any such ihten- 
tion, but such may be the result. 

The answer comes back to me, all this maybe 
avoided by the simple act of justice to be per- 
formed by the States, the enfranchisement of 
the blacks. Well, is it right to enfranchise 
them? Do you say so? You do not so de- 
clare, but you expressly declare the right to 
disfranchise. You admit that a good reason 
may exist for the disfranchisement, and invite 
- 'i it by implication. Suppose the white southern 
landlords agree to accept your proposition. 
Suppose that they take diminished representa- 
tion and unjust taxes by Congress, both upon 
themselves and the negroes, in lieu of the right 
which you propose to give them, the right to 
deny the negro representation in the State or- 

— ganizations and the privilege to fleece him from 
year to year of his hard earnings by unjust State 
laws? Has Missourino interest in this bargain? 
Remember, if the negro is represented in Con- 
gress, his interest is the same as that of my con- 
stituents. Our forefathers gave him a three- 
fifths representation as a slave, and a full rep- 
resentation when free. This proposition offers 
a bargain by which the southern white may rob 
thenegro. providedhe, forhimselfandthenegro, 
will consent to be robbed at the discretion of 
others. Massachusetts and South Carolina 



made a bargain once before — T mean the bar- 
gain by which piracy was legalized and man 
stealing carried on by law until America was 
filled with slaves. Other people suffered by 
this thing. My State luid others are likely to 
suffer by this new compact, and I think it best 
to have nothing to do with it. 

But I have said the people will ask what 
this amendment means. It can mean but one 
of two things. First, it is intended to deny 
representation to a non-voting population ; or, 
second, it is intended to secure sufifrage to the 
negro. 

If the committee intend to secure the first 
object, it must be because of the existence of a 
correct, living, vital principle in our Govern- 
ment, that a non-voting population in one of the 
States ought not to be represented in the Federal 
Government. If this be the design, I should 
like to ask on what princijjle the women, mi- 
nors, and aliens are to be retained in the basis 
of representation ? If any principle be involved, 
these, too, must be excluded from the euumera- 
tion in each State because they do not vote. If 
it be said that no principle is involved, but that 
it is a mere matter of temporary expediency, I 
answer that I will never give my sanction to a 
constitutional provision on any such consider- 
ations. If there be no principle involved, then 
the amendment should not be made. But 
whence comes this idea, I have already asked, 
that a non-voting free population shall npt be 
represented in Congress? Every tradition of 
our fathers; every utterance by those who 
builded our institutions; every principle on 
which they are founded, utterly reject and con- 
demn the idea as false and mischievous. Our 
fathers left the suffrage with the States. Suf- 
frage at that day was much more limited than 
it now is. In some States only freeholders voted ; 
in some the heads of families ; in all a property 
qualification was necessary ; in some the free 
negroes voted, in others they did not. Mr. 
Madison said : 

"The definitionof the right of suffrage is very justly 
regarded as a fundamental article of republican gov- 
ernment." 

And he says further: 

" To have reduced the different qualifications in the 
different States to one uniform rule would i)robably 
have Ijeen as dissatisfactory to some of the States as 
it would have been to the Convention." 

Hence the Convention left the suffrage ques- 
tion to the States, believing, in the language of 
Mr; Madison, that it could not be "feared that 
the people of the States will alter this part of 
their constitution in such a manner as to abridge 
the rights secured to them by the Federal Con- 
stitution." In this Mr. Madison and the good 
men of his day were deceived. The States in many 
instances, itis true, enlarged the right of suffrage 
to the whites, but as slavery became profitable, 
the rights of the free negroes were gradually 
"abridged," until all, except some of the New 
England States, denied them the suffrage. I 



26 



infer from this language of Mr. Madison, if the 
Convention could have foreseen this revolution 
in sentiment, the child of avarice in the white 
man, and not the result of discovered incai)a- 
city in the Wack for the duties of citizenship, 
some provision would have been made to pi'e- 
vent tJtiis abridgment of the suffrage. I am 
left to infer us much from what he says, in the 
thirty-ninth number of the Federalist, in deiln- 
ing a republic. He says : 

" It is essential to such a Government that it be de- 
rived from the great body of tlio society, not from an 
inconsiderable proportion, or a favored class of it; 
otherwise, a handful of tyrannical nobles, exercising 
their oppressions by a delegation of their powers, 
might aspire to the rank of republicans and claim 
for their Uovernment the honorable title of republic." 

These things were not provided against be- 
cause they were not anticipated. They have 
now come upon us, and it behooves us to rem- 
edy the evil, not by saying the evil may con- 
tinue, and if it does, we will add another evil 
to it, but by making our State governments truly 
republican. 

Representation was purposely made unequal 
in the Senate, but in the lower House it was 
purposely placed where the States could not 
alter it if they would. It was based, not on 
voters, but on the masses of people, old and 
young, black and white, sane and insane, ex- 
cluding Indians not taxed and including three 
fifths of the slaves. There was a contest as to 
whether slaves should be represented in the 
Federal basis. There never was any contest 
as to free persons. All admitted the justice of 
including them in the ratio. In the fifty- fourth 
number of the Federalist, Mr. Madison says : 

"It is not contended that the number of people in 
each State ought not to be the standard for regulat- 
ing the proportion of those who are to represent the 
people of each State." 

He says further, in that connection, that — 

" The establishment of the same rule for the ap- 
portionment of taxes will probably be as little con- 
tested." 

Though he insists the rule in the latter case is 
not founded on the same principle. This is 
true. Nobody can doubt that representation 
should be based on population. Taxes may 
properly be based on wealth ; but is it not 
monstrous that a proposition should be urged, 
at this day of experience in the science of gov- 
ernment, proposing that representation should 
be substantially confined to voters, while taxa- 
tion is purposely left to be apportioned on nnm- 
ijers? Missouri has now a greater population than 
Massachusetts. Massachusetts has three times 
her wealth. Under this rule Missouri will pay 
larger taxes than Massachusetts and have less 
power in Congress. Mr. Madison said that 
representation should be based on population 
because "the rule is understood to refer to the 
personal rights of the people, with which it has 
a natural and universal connection." In the 
case of taxation, he said "the rule is in no 
case a precise measure and in ordinary cases a 



very unfit one." The less wealthy States had 
to accept the rule in the case of taxation. It 
was then, and is now, hard enough. 

But when I am asked to give up political power, 
that the practical application of an always un- 
just rule in taxation, now to be made odious, 
may be enforced against me, I cannot, I will 
not, consent. It is no answer to say that you 
mean well. If so, why not do well? The ne- 
groes of the South must be included in the 
ratio of Federal representation or we are no 
better than those who exclude them from th; 
suffrage. You give their former owners the 
right to drive them from the ballot-box, and 
the only punishment you propose is to rob both 
the oppressor and the oppressed of their money. 
It is a compromise that the whites may govern 
the blacks in the State governments of the 
South and wring from them sweat and teai-s, 
provided the northern and eastern States are 
permitted to control the national Government. 
This is a Government of the entire people. 
Women and minors have an interest in it. 
Your legislation acts upon them. It gathers 
taxes of them without asking them if their 
respective States permit them to vote. Why 
should they not be represented here,_ even 
though they are not permitted to vote in the 
States? The Constitution provides that — <. 

"The Congress shall have power to lay and collect 
taxes, duties, imposts, and excises, to pay the debts 
and provide for the common defense and general wel- 
fare of the United States." 

If the negroes now in the State of Louisiana 
continue to live there with the whites, their pur- 
suits will be of the same character as those of 
the whites. Whatever may be existing preju- 
dices between the whites and the blacks, the 
future will develop an identity of interests. 
What is favorable to one will be favorable to 
the other. What is injurious to one will be 
injurious to the other. If the white man grows 
sugar-cane and makes sugar in Louisiana, the 
negro will do the same. If, in Alabama, the old 
planter or Yankee adventurer who will go down 
there, undertakes to grow cotton, the negro will 
grow cotton also, and the interests of the planter 
and the Yankee adventurer and the negro are 
identically the same. You cannot separate them. 
Have the women of Maine and Massachusetts 
no interest in the legislation of Congress? Do 
you dare say that they are not interested as 
much as the men? Do they not pay taxes? 
The Senator from Massachusetts told us the 
other day that James Otis said that taxation 
without representation is tyranny. The Sena- 
tor from Maryland [Mr. Joiixsox] replied that 
this referred only to representation in the Eng- 
lish Parliament, where we had none. But if 
the principle be true only as applied in that 
case, how dare you make partial representa- 
tion? If it be odious and tyrannical to deny 
representation entirely, the least diminution of 
it opens the door to wrong. Lead us not into 
temptation. Power is dangerous, when prop- 



27 



^ 



erly obtained. When unjustly obtained, it can- 
not exist, except in the corrupt elements which 
gave it birth. 

Mr. SUMNER. I will remind the Senator 
that Otis claimed representation for each indi- 
vidual. He did not claim it merely for the 
communilv. 

Mr. HENDERSON. I did not know that 
he went to that extent in the speech alluded to. 
It only malves the case stronger. 

Mr. SUMNER. He did, as I shall show at 
the proper time. 

Mr. HENDERSON. I was very well satis- 
fied, without examining his views, that the prin- 
ciple he laid down must go to that extent. Half 
representation is half as bad as no representa- 
tion. If it be tyranny to deny it entirely, it is 
half tyranny to deny the half, and half tyranny 
is equally a violation of the great principle of 
right. It is only a difference in degi'ee ; it is 
onlj' modified tyranny, but it is tyranny at last. 

Now, sir, Congress is constantly revising our 
impost duties ; and equally often we revise our 
stamp, income, and excise taxes ; and if you 
will give the distinguished Senator from Maine. 
[Mr. Fessexdex,] the chairman of the Com- 
mittee on Finance, the power to regulate im- 
post and excise duties according to his will and 
pleasure, it is quite certain that he can build 
up the jaeople of the State of Maine, or the 
people of all New England if he choose, and 
make them rich while other sections may be 
dragged down to poverty. Look at the varied 
products of this country and think how taxes 
may be adjusted. You do not raise cotton in 
Maine, nor in Massachusetts, nor in any other 
New England State. But you manufacture 
the article in large quantities. Cotton is the 
chief production of a great many of the south- 
ern States. Suppose you increase your tariff 
on cotton goods and levy an excise tax upon 
the growth of cotton in the southern States, 
giving a drawback for the tax on the raw ma- 
terial, as you proposed at the last session of 
Congress to the manufacturer, but denying it 
to the producer, thereby levying in effect an 
export tax and paying bounties to the manu- 
facturer, how long before New England would 
be filled with the stream of wealth that had its 
source in the sweat of southern laborers? 

Is not the negro interested in this? He may 
have no ballot in Alabama. But this should 
excite your sympathy and not tempt you to 
rob him. The same may be said of the sugar 
interests of Louisiana, the tobacco and grape 
interests of Missouri, the turpentine interests 
of North Carolina, the pork interests of Ohio, 
and the whisky interests of Illinois and Indiana. 

It is useless to spend time in enumerating the 
many evils to spring from unequal and unfair 
representation. They meet us at every step. 
When representation in the lower House be- 
comes unequal, the salt of the Constitution is 
gone. This looks like an effort to give the 



power in the lower House, by another compro- 
mise, to the same section of country to which 
an undue power was given in the Senate. If it 
must be done, let it be done in another name 
than mercy to the Ijlack man. 

Again, the Constitution provides: 

" The Congress shall have power to regulate com- 
merce with foreign nations, and among the several 
States, and with the Indian tribes." 

In the formation of the Constitution this 
power was considered by the commercial States 
of such great importance to them that in con- 
sideration thereof they bartered away the lib- 
erties of a race. With unequal representation 
in the hands of the commercial section, what 
injuries might not be inflicted on the agricul- 
tural portions of the community? 

Are not the negroes interested in the exercise 
of this power by Congress? For many years 
they must look to agriculture for support. 
Laws, oppressive to them and ruinous to their 
pursuits, may be passed under this and other 
clauses of -the Constitution. The interests of 
the negro deserve consideration ■■ ■' ether he 
enjoys the franchise or not. 

Again, Congress has the power "to declare 
war,"' "to raise and support armies," "to pro- 
vide and maintain a na^^'." The mercantile 
interests of our nation are now in no kind mood 
toward England. I do not propose to speak of 
the action of England during our late war, or 
to condemn or indorse the denunciations of her 
conduct toward us. I simply refer to our pres- 
ent attitude to that Power to show the injustice 
of the pending proposition. Is M'ar to be de- 
clared? Some persons desire it to be done, and 
thousands of our people might grow rich with 
"letters of marque and reprisal." The mercan- 
tile interests might be rejoiced at an opportunity 
to retaliate for real or imaginary wrongs. How- 
ever such a war might gratify indi\'idual or sec- 
tional feeling, however it might add to our 
national glory, j'ct it would be a war of vast 
projiortions, destroying the material interests of 
the nation, plunging us into almost hopeless 
bankruptcy, and bringing poverty and misery 
to all classes. If a minority of the people, in- 
habiting the Atlantic 'itates, had the power and 
the will to declare such a war, and to impress 
the majority into the armies of the nation to 
maintain it, what sort of a Government would 
ours be ? Can it be said that the negro of the 
southern States, struggling in poverty to support 
himself and family, has no interest in preventing 
this war, simply because he has no ballot? 
What difference does that make to us? The 
women of New England who did not vote de- 
nounced the war of 1812, and rightly held theii 
places, in the basis of congressional representa- 
tion, to force an early peace after an ilnprofit- 
able and unavailing war. The women and men 
of New England denounced the war of 184C 
with Mexico. Had the women and minors been 
excluded from the basis of their representation. 



28 



and war then declared against the voice of New 
England voters, another war than the Mexican 
war might have come. In such event, who would 
have said that the women and minors had no 
interest in the matter and therefore no right 
to complain, because thej could not vote iu their 
respective States ? 

I might continue this course of remark, but I 
dismiss it ■and look for a moment to the popu- 
lation South and some of the effects to be pro- 
duced. 

If these States shall deny the suffrage, then 
by this rule you exclude from representation, 
in the single State of Virginia, 548,907 human 
beings, largely more than the white population 
of Kansas, Delaware, Minnesota, Oregon, and 
Florida, under the census of 18G0. Think of 
it, Mr. President. These five States are enti- 
tled to six Representatives and ten Senators in 
Congress, with a white population of 499,117, 
•which is 40,790 less than the negro population 
of the single State of Virginia. You have six 
Senators and ten Representatives in Congress, 
representing a white population in these States 
less than the negro population of the single 
State of Virginia. Do your excise laws not 
reach these negroes? Do not your tariff laws 
reach them? Will they not have to buy im- 
ported goods, and pay like others your excise 
and income taxes? I am answered, "If the 
States want justice done to the negroes and 
themselves, let them admit the negroes to the 
right of suffrage." That is not satisfactory. 
Suppose, as I have said, the whites of these 
States resolve to accept the compromise or 
bargain you tender them? Suppose they take 
the chances of unjust legislation for the priv- 
ilege of robljing the negro by local law ? 

But I proceed. The five States named have 
a representative population, as the Constitu- 
tion now stands, of only 559,017, which is but 
10,110 more than the negro population of Vir- 
ginia. The negro population of Georgia ex- 
ceeds the white population of Rhode Island, 
Kansas, Delaware, and Oregon, by 45,525. The 
negro population of Mississippi exceeds the 
white population of the States last named by 
upwards of 17,000. These States have five Rep- 
resentatives and eight Senators in Congress. 

The negro population of Georgia and South 
Carolina is 878,018, largely more than the en- 
tire white population of New Hampshire, Ver- 
mont, and Rhode Island, it being only 810,636. 
These States have six Senators and eight Rep- 
resentatives, but this vast population of nearly 
a million souls will go unrepresented. Add the 
negro population of Virginia to that of Georgia 
and South Carolina, and it almost equals the 
white poiiulation of Maine, New Hampshire, 
Vermont, and Rhode Island. 

The proposed amendment does not declare 
that this population shall go unrepresented, 
but it implies that a good reason may exist for 
their local disfranchisement in tlie States, and 



if the States do regard them as brutes, and not 
persons, they can do so. I, for one, am totally 
unwilling to permit them to do it. I append a 
comparative table showing the population white 
and black in 18G0 in fifteen States, the number 
of Representatives they now have, the number 
to which they would be entitled under the Con- 
stitution as it is, the number to which they 
would be entitled under the committee's plan, 
in case the negroes are excluded, the propor- 
tion of direct tax allotted to each under the ac( 
of 18G1, levying a tax of $20,000,000, andthe 
proportion each of said States would be required 
to pay of a twenty million tax under that 
Constitution as it now stands, and as the commit- 
tee proposes to leave it, their slaves being free: 



o o o -"S= cr» a So « p 2 r 



o 



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To sliow the monstrous injustice, however, 
that may result from the proposed amendment, 
I may state that should it be adopted and 
a direct tax of $20,000,000 be levied, the ap- 
portionment to Virginia would be $1,015,258. 
The representation of Virginia in the lower 
branch of Congress would be nine members. 
•T'he State of Illinois, with sixteen mem- 
bers in Congress, would pay but $1,088,800. 
Kansas, with one member, would pay $68, 183. 
Oregon, with one member, would pay $83,367. 
Minnesota, with two members, would pay 
$109,470. Delaware, with one member, would 
pay $71,369. New Hampshire, with three 
members, would pay $206,382. Vermont, 
with three members, would pay $200,402. And 
Maine, with six members, would pay $399,585. 
Hence, these eight States, headed by the great 
State of Illinois, and including three of the 
New England Sta.tes, would altogether pay 
$2,177,556. The State of Virginia would have 
to pay over one million, or nearly half this sum. 
Virginia would be represented by two Senators 
and nine Representati%'es, while the States I 
have named would be represented by sixteen 
Senators and thirty-three Representatives. Un- 
der such circumstances the peculiar interests of 
Virginia industry might possibly be protected 



by these Representatives from States having 
diverse interests, but to believe it requires a 
belief in the improvement of man's moral na- 
ture far beyond what it promises to be in our 
day. If a vast public debt is to be paid, the 
representatives of peculiar interests will likely 
forget the plodding negro in the South, in their 
efforts to protect those interests and commend 
themselves to their own constituents. It mat- 
ters not by whom the Virginia Representative 
may be elected, if when here his votes shall 
be cast in favor of the negro's interest. If he 
represents the whites he cannot fail to repre- 
sent the negroes, for their pursuits are regulated 
by soil and climate and productions. Their 
pursuits are necessarily similar and their inter- 
ests cannot be divided. 

If, then, the object of the committee be to 
deny representation to citizens of the United 
States merely because the States see fit to deny 
them the suffrage, I think I have shown it to be 
politically wrong, leading to acts of injustice 
and oppression on the one side, and to poverty 
and humiliation on the other. I thank the Sen- 
ator from Massachusetts [Mr. Sttmxer] for his 
amendment to perfect this proposition. It de- 
clares that if the negro is to be excluded from 
the basis of representation, he must be excluded 
likewise from the basis of taxation. That is 
fair, and argues a mind fully imbued with the 
foundation principles of civil liberty. But if 
this amendment, which is but the repetition of 
the highest tribute we have ever paid our Re- 
public, should be adopted, the amendment itself, 
I suspect, would be abandoned. You leave it 
to the States to exclude the negro from suffrage. 
If the States do so, you accept the action and 
at once proceed to say he is a brute, a thing 
that cannot enter into the basis of Federal rep- 
resentation. If, in your judgment, the negro 
be a person, how shall he be excluded from rep- 
resentation? This rule, in Mr. Madison' s opin- 
ion, is the true one and proper to protect "'per- 
sonal rights." The whole Convention of 1787, 
a body of pure and upright and wise men, be- 
lieved with him. If they were right, you cannot 
deny the negro representation without ignoring 
every profession of the Republican party and a 
most impoi'tant principle of republican theory. 
But if he be a thing, and unworthy of represen- 
tation, how is it that he is more than a thing 
for purposes of taxation ? If he is a drone, un- 
fit to vote, and therefore should have no more 
voice in Congress than a stone or a stick, why 
should he be required to pay money for Gov- 
ernment purposes ? If he be an unreasoning 
animal, it is enough that he provide himself 
with the means of life. If he is without capa- 
city, white men should scorn to take from him 
the little he may accumulate. 

Mr. SUMNER. Allow me to remind my 
friend that the argument of Otis and of our rev- 
olutionary fathers was. that there should be no 
taxation, director indirect, where there was no 
representation. 

Mr. HENDERSON. That is certainly the 



32 



to arrive at them cannot receive my sanction. 
I coultl not vote for his bill two years .ago to 
abolish slavery ; I cannot vote for his bill to 
secure political rights now. I desired emanci- 
pation then, but took a different road to arrive 
at it. I desire that no State law hereafter shall 
be permitted to set up the senseless test of color 
in hxing the qualifications of voters. But I am 
not now ready to take away from the States the 
long-enjoyed right of prescribing the qualifica- 
tions of electors in their own limits. Congress 
is not now prepared to take and exercise prop- 
erly this power. Local reasons may exist, and do 
often exist, for excluding certain persons from 
the ballot. The people of each State can better 
judge of these reasons than Congress or the 
people in other States. But the United States 
is certainly interested in maintaining a repub- 
lican form of government — republican both in 
theory and in jiractice. 

No State can vitally wound the true repub- 
lican principle that ' ' all men are created equal, ' ' 
and that when government is to be established, 
its just powers must come from ''the consent 
of the governed," without causing injury and 
bringing disease into the entire system. If 
wrong be done in one of the States, it is event- 
ually felt by the nation. If a State becomes 
an oligarchy, the deleterious influences are not 
alone confined to the limits of the State. They 
cannot be so confined, because the few elect- 
ors who control State policy are the same who 
Send IJepresentatives to Congress. The mem- 
bersof the Legislature, chosen by those electors, 
select the Senators who sit with us here. If 
the fountain be muddy, the stream is not clear. 
If the electors be aristocrats, the representa- 
tives will rarely be republicans. The right 
of suffrage," said Mr. Madison, "is a funda- 
mental article in republican constitutions." 
"The regulation of it," he further said, "is at 
the same time a task of peculiar delicacy. ' ' He 
said, in another paper: 

"It would be happy if a state of society could be 
founil or tramed in which an equal voice in making 
the laws might be allowed to every individual bound 
to obey them. 13ut this is a theory which, like most 
tlicories, confessedly requires limitations and modi- 
fications.'" — Madison Papers, Appendix, vol. 3, p. 15. 

We all feel the force of these simple words, 
" Suffrage is a fundamental article of repub- 
lican constitutions." How true! But yet Mr. 
Madison and the fathers were content, accord- 
ing to my reading, to leave the whole subject 
with the States, under the hope that the people 
thereof would not "abridge the rights secured 
to them." That the States have abridged the 
rights of suffrage and have violated the funda- 
mental rule of republicanism, as then under- 
stood in theory, we cannot doubt. An impor- 
tant question, however, to be considered is, 
were the theoretical views of republicanism 
entertained at that day ingrafted on the Con- 
stitution? I think not. They made a written 
Constitution, and when they speak of repub- 
Hcafi forms of government in the instrument 
itself, they mean simply a conformity with that 
Constitution. Our fathers did not sanction or 



approve of, slavery, but they left it existing in 
what they called republican forms. The time 
has now come, foreseen by Mr. Madison, (see 
No. 43 Federalist, ) when a " minority of citizens 
in some of the States" has become a " majority 
of persons," when, indeed, a majority of per- 
sons is found in that ' ' unhappy species of popu- 
lation abounding in some of the States who, 
during the calm of regular government, are 
sunk below the level of man." Truly those-. 
men have now "emerged into the human^ 
character," and unless they have the suffrage, 
the republican system will become diseased. 
Violence and revolution must follow a denial 
of suffrage to a majority of free persons in a 
State, especially when that majority are the 
subjects, not only of prejudice, but hatred. - 
But, on the other hand, as this Is a practical 
question, and must be dealt with In a practical 
way, I am free to say that I would not to- day open 
the polls in the seceded States, were It in my 
power, tothe entire population, white and black. 
When there is a way to effect a great good 
without any evil, that way should be adopted. 
Good is often accomplished through blood, but 
when It conies in peace, accepted by all, how 
much better it is ! What would be the result of 
indiscriminate suffrage now in the South? The ^ 
whites for two hundred years have taken the ' 
labor of the black without further comi:)ensa- 
tion than a scanty support. Perhaps that was 
all their labor was worth. I do not pass judg- 
ment on that question now. The negro is ig- 
norant and brutalized by this long period of 
slavery. Perhaps the white man would be no 
better under similar circumstances. I doubt if 
he would. The negro is poor ; the white man 
has something left, but not much. The little 
he has, the negro thinks belongs or ought to 
belong, in part at least, to him. The belief 
may be well founded In justice. I will not pass 
judgment here either. The white is offended 
that his grasp has been violently loosed from his 
slave, and like all angry mortals must wreak 
his vengeance on somebody. He has not power ^V 
to harm the conqueror; he harms the innocent 
object of the conqueror's kindness. Like other 
disappointed men, he would destroy that which 
he can use no longer. The feelings of the ig- 
norant and degraded negro may well be im- 
agined, and I leave to the Senator from Massa- 
chusetts to imagine the consequences of an 
open, full, and unlimited ballot m those States 
now, and especially where the negroes have the 
numerical majority. Perhaps their excesses, 
following the ignorant, unskilled use of power, 
would set back, for years, this great reform. I 
have no time for further comment on the con- 
sequences of such conduct. 

It is. In my judgment, yet proper to leave 
the qualifications of electors with the States, 
but not to the extent of allowing them to in- 
troduce disease and death into the body-poli- 
tic, by denying In their own organizations the 
elementary principles of republicanism. Mis- 
souri has an Interest In the State governments of 
Virginia, Louisiana, and Texas. If these gov- 



33 



emments become diseased, the whole body suf- 
fers, for the States are but limbs of that body. 
Our governments must be truly republican. 
The present Constitution tolerates something 
else. Let us amend it. The preamble of the 
honorable Senator's resolution indicates that 
the power to jiass it is claimed, first, in the 
guarantee clause, and second, in the constitu- 
tionrlamendmen! aljolishing slavery. It seems 
admitted that the i^owcr must be derived from 
these provisions of the Constitution or it does 
*faot exist at all. 

■^ Mr. YATES. Will the Senator allow me to 
interrupt him? 

Mr. HENDERSON. Certainly. 

Mr. YATES. I hope that I am not inter- 
jecting what I have to say in a wrong place in 
,^, the Senator's speech, but I wish to ask him 
a question. The constitutional amendment, 
which has recently been adopted, abolishes 
slavery in all the States ; in other words, it 
secures freedom to the freedmen. It is not a 
latitudinarian construction to say that it secures 
full freedom to the freedraan. Can ^ill free- 
dom be conferred upon the freedman without 
conferring upon him all his rights, natural, civil, 
and political? The second clause of the con- 
stitutional amendment says that Congress shall 
g have power to enforce it; that is, to confer 
i full freedom upon the freedmen, for to abolish 
slavery means to confer freedom. 

Another point. Congress, before the adop- 
tion of the amendment, could not make a citi- 
zen, and a State could not make a citizen. 
" We, the people of the United States," "do 
ordain and establish this Constitution." The 
people made the Constitution, not the Consti- 
tution the people. But the Dred Scott decis- 
ion declared that because a slave might be 
bought and sold when the Constitution was 
made, because at that time he was not recog- 
nized as a member of the society, because he 
had no rights which a white man was bound 
to respect, therefore he was not one of the peo- 
ple, not one of the sovereignty. By the con- 
* stitutional amendment abolishing slavery, the 
freedman becomes what? He becomes one of 
the sovereigns, he is emancipated into the peo- 
ple of the United States ; and Congress having 
no power before to make a citizen, except to 
naturalize a foreigner, and the States having 
no right whatever to malce a citizen, althougla 
they may regulate and make the rules by which 
he may vote, the freedman, the moment the act 
of emancipation was proclaimed, became one 
of the people of the United States. " We, the 
people of the United States," "do ordain and 
establish this Constitution." 

Well, sir, the question which I wish to pro- 
pound to the Senator fi-om Missouri, for whose 
opinions I have great respect, is, why there is 
any necessity for constitutional amendments 
when we have the power under the amendment 
to the Constitution already adopted now to 
secure not only in South Carolina or Georgia, 

\t in every State of the American Union, 
i. aedom, full freedom, civil and political eman- 



cipation to every man who comes within that 
provision of the Constitution. 

Mr. HENDERSON. Mr. President- 
Mr. YATES. I am trespassing ujiou tlie 
gentleman's time. 

Mr. HENDERSON. I think I understand 
the Senator, and I only rose to ask him a ques- 
tion which I think will furnish an answer to all 
of his questions, for they all bear on the same 
point. I ask him if there is any slavery or in- 
voluntary servitude in the State of Illinois? Is 
it not a free State? 

Mr. YATES. There is not at the present 
time any slavery there, and cannot be, I believe. 

Mr. HENDERSON. Was there slavery or 
involuntary servitude in that State before the 
constitutional amendment abolishing slavery? 

Mr. YATES. There cannot be slavery un- 
der the amendment of the Constitution. It is 
impossible. 

Mr. HENDERSON. There is, then, no 
slavery now — and there was no slavery before 
the amendment. I so understand the Senator ; 
he assents to the proposition. Now, how is it 
that Illinois does not permit her negroes to vote? 
She did not before, and does not now, allow 
them to vote. Then Illinois is not a free State. 

Mr. YATES. That is the reason that I pro- 
pose by a bill which shall apply to every State,_ 
not only to Missouri but to Illinois, to declare' 
that these men shall have the rights secured to 
them by the amendment of the Constitution. 

Mr. HENDERSpN. I am left to infer, then, 
that slavery exists where the ballot does not 
exist? I will ask the Senator another question. 
Are the women of Illinois free or slave ? 

Mr. YATES. I notice that when gentlemen 
are driven to the point and to the wall upon 
this question, they invariably ask, why do you 
not let women vote? 

_ Mr. HENDERSON. Not at all. The ques- 
tion of woman suffrage is not before us. My 
remark springs naturally from the Senator's 
position. I have neither condemned nor ap- 
proved such suffrage. The Senator says slavery 
has been abolished, and to abolish slavery is to 
confer the suffrage ; in other words, he assumes 
that the denial of suffrage is slavery. I thought 
not. The suffrage may be the best means to 
pi-eserve freedom ; I think it is. But if the 
person denied the suffrage, in one of the States 
is a slave, then slavery exists in all the States, 
for women and minors do not vote in any one 
of them, I would perpetuate the negro's free- 
dom ; but I would do it in such manner as to 
be effectual. 

Mr. YATES. I will answer that at the 
proper time. 

Mr. PIENDERSON. I am only discussing 
a question of power. The Senator seems to 
think I am combatting his desires. I am not 
disputing his proposition that the negro ought 
to have the siL^frage. but I am speaking of the 
way in which it may lie legally done and the 
extent to which the ballot may be safely carried. 
The Senator from Massachusetts proposes to 
do by an act of Congress what I think can only 



34 



be done by a constitutional amendment. That 
is the difference now between the Senator from 
Illinois and m3^self. I think the amendment 
can be adopted. Indeed, I feel confident of it. 

Mr. SUMNER. What amendment? 

Mr. HENDERSON. _ An ainendm_ent_ to 
the Constitution preventing any di.scrimination 
against the negro in the right of suffrage because 
of color. 

Mr. SUMNER. It cannot. 

Mr. HENDERSON. I thought, in the bright 
lexicon of the Senator from Massachusetts 
there was no such word as "fail." 

Mr. SUMNER. I thought the Senator meant 
that this proposition of the reconstruction com- 
mittee could be adopted. 

Mr. HENDERSON. Oh no, I never thought 
that. 

Mr. SUMNER. I believe that the Senator' s 
proposition can be adopted, gratefully adopted 
by the country, but the other cannot be. 

Mr. YATES. I only put my question for 
the purpose of showing that under the Consti- 
tution as it now is, under the new Constitution, 
so far as the freedmen are concerned, all dis- 
tinctions on account of color are abolished, 
and all that it requires is appropriate legislation 
to carry into effect that provision of the Con- 
•stitution. It is made our duty to do it ; it is 
thrown into our hands by the people. 

Mr. HENDERSON. I was .speaking of the 
power to pass this bill under the guarantee 
clause, and not of the power under the consti- 
tutional amendment abolishing slavery, at the 
particular moment when the Senator inter- 
rupted me, for which interruption I am quite 
frateful, because I am always glad to hear him. 
was speaking of the guarantee clause and was 
resisting the position assumed by the Senator 
from Massachusetts, [Mi-. Sumner,] in claim- 
ing the power to pass his bill under the guar- 
antee clause. Now the Senator from Illinois 
thinks that the constitutional amendment and 
not the guarantee clause gives the power. I 
understand him to say that the guarantee clause 
does not give it; that is, he admits that before 
the adoption of the constitutional amendment 
there was no power in Congress to compel a 
State to admit its negroes to the right of suf- 
frage. 

Mr. YATES._ I will explain. I think that 
under the decisions of the Supreme Court, be- 
fore the adoption of the constitutional amend- 
ment, a State had the right to exclude the col- 
ored man from voting, because he was consid- 
ered a slave, and not one of the sovereign 
people. But now the case is altered under the 
amended Constitution ; he is one of the peo- 
ple. 

Mr. HENDERSON. The decision did not 
adjudge, I hope, a free negro to be a slave. 
The Drcd Scott case did not deny that a State 
could give the franchise to a free negro. Nations, 
as well as individuals, Mr. President, some- 
times backslide. There may be such a thing 
as a national fall from grace. Communities 
sometimes retrograde. The cases of individual 



reaction are numerous. "We are yet doomed 
to see many more. Let individuals fall back 
if they see tit, but let our action here be such 
as to insure rational and steady progress. The 
English Parliament and people traveled far 
along the road of human progress in their con- 
tests with Charles I. They fell back, however, 
and for many long years the milestone then 
planted by them was lost to their vision. The 
French Revolution, that most sublime convul- 
sion of human j^assion and human aspiratioDj 
struck the shackles from twenty-five million 
people, who, rising from the degradation and 
misery produced by ages of misrule and opj^res- 
sion, proclaimed liberty, fraternity, equality to 
all men. Yet they soon fell back from their 
advanced position. Their own excesses, their 
divisions, and irrational measures paved the 
way for a new dynasty. Louis XVI went to the 
guillotine, and Napoleon came to the throne. 

This is a most important e^joch in our his- 
tory. We now have seven or eight million 
dissatisfied, discontented, maddened whites. 
They art to be restored to the body-politic and 
made contented. The nation can be generous. 
It must be generous. But charity must not be 
converted into weakness. Four million ne- 
groes commingled with a hostile population, 
scarcely knowing whether they are slave or free, 
uneducated, immersed in poverty, ready for any 
scheme to benefit themselves, and yet too igno- 
rantto select the best means, they must bo cared 
for, and a way be provided to give them con- 
tentment and knowledge and security for the 
future. They demand our sympathy, but that 
must be the sympathy of reasoning men, and 
not the fruitless simpering of children. If we 
make mistakes now it will be many years be- 
fore we can recover. Let none be made. But 
I may dismiss all questions affecting the policy 
of this bill, for it is enough that it is unconsti- 
tutional. 

To return to the point from which I digressed, 
I repeat, that, for all purposes connected with 
this bill, in determining what is a republican 
form of government, we must look to the Con- 
stitution itself, we must be controlled by facts 
and not b}' theories. Theory is good to induce 
a change of organic law, but it is not good to 
authorize legislation in the face of that law. 
Our forefathers, in fact, admitted the republic- 
anism of Virginia with two hundred and ninety- 
three thousand slaves ; the republicanism of 
Maryland with one hundred and three thousand 
.slaves ; that of North Carolina with one hun- 
dred thousand, and South Carolina with one 
hundred and seven thousand. If these States 
could be republican in form with so large a 
number of their people in slavery, surely the 
denial of suffrage alone could not, liy any an- 
alogy, take from them the character of repub- 
licanism. I would be glad to think otherwise, 
but I cannot force my mind to believe what 
contradicts the history of the time. 

Mr. SUMNER. Do I understand my friend 
as insisting that the denial of the franchise is 
consistent with a republican government ? For 



35 



instance, take the State of South Carolina, which 
denies the franchise to more than half its pop- 
ulation. 

Mr. HENDERSON. In theory it is not. 
Under the Constitution it was regarded as a 
republican State at the time of the adoption 
of the instrument. 

Mr. S CJMNER. It did not deny the fran- 
chise to more than half its citizens then ; they 
were slaves. 

xMr. HENDERSON. It then had only one 
ht.ndred and forty thousand whites, and had 
one hundred and seven thousand slaves. It also 
had eighteen hundred free negroes. I think it 
more nearly a republican State now than then. 
Practically, the question of suffrage was left to 

the States 

~* Mr. SUMNER. But that is the question, 
whether they were left to deny the suffrage to 
any freeman on account of color. 

Mr. HENDERSON. If that be the ques- 
tion, then the point is against my friend, for 
both South Carolina and Virginia did deny the 
suffrage to the free negroes on account of color 
only, at the time when the Constitution was 
made, and when it was adopted. Virginia had 
upward of twelve thousand free negroes thus 
denied. 

i/Mv. SUMNER. But the question is— I can- 
not anticipate my friend's conclusion on that 
point 

Mr. HENDERSON. My conclusion is, that 
a mistake was made in recognizing a constitu- 
tion as rei^ublican that permitted slavery. I 
knew of no way to get rid of it except by con- 
stitutional amendment. I think another mis- 
take was committed in leaving each State to so 
far abridge the right of suffi-age as to change, 
in theory, the republican form. But such is. the 
Constitution and you cannot change it by act 
of Congress. That is my conclusion. 

Mr. SUMNER. You are wrong; it is a 
question of theory, and I say that our fathers 
so held. 

^ Mr. HENDERSON. But our fathers did 
'lot deal with it in the Constitution as a question 
of theory, but as a question of fact. Whatever 
may have been their theories, I mean only to 
say that the text of the Constitution does not 
carry them out 

Mr. SUMNER. Now, the practical point 
is, did our fathers concede to any State the 
power of disfranchising citizens on account of 
color ? I utterly deny it, and I challenge my 
friend to show any authority for it. 

Mr. HENDERSON. Why, Mr. President, 
if I have already failed to show it, I must fail 
in the future. I have shown that the suffrage 
was left to the States, and that they did exclude 
their negroes ; that they held in slavery in 
Virginia almost half of their population, and 
that Virginia was called a republican State. 
Indeed, she was most prominent in making 
the very provisions we are discussing. She 
excluded the slaves and 

Mr. SUMNER. Ah! slaves. That is an- 
other thing. The question is whether you are 



allowed to disfranchise freemen on account of 

color, whether you are allowed to deny them 
their rights as citizens. That I utterly deny. 
The exception was with regard to slaves who 
were not regarded as members of the body-pol- 
itic. They were in that respect treated as mi- 
nors or as women, represented by their masters ; 
but every freeman, no matter what his color 
was, was recognized as entitled to all the priv- 
ileges of citizenship. He was one of the 
sovereigns. The proposition cannot be met, 
if my friend will consult the history of his 
country. 

Mr. HENDERSON. It was not slaves only 
that were disfranchised, but I have shown that 
free negroes were also disfranchised. But I 
have no controversy with the Senator in what 
we mutually aim at. 

Mr. SUMNER. I know that, and I concede 
to my excellent friend, of course, all that I claim 
for myself. We are in search of the best that 
can be done on this occasion. I applaud his 
zeal and thank him for his courtesy. 

Mr. HENDERSON. I am certainly very 
much obliged to the Senator from Massachu- 
setts. I feel now ten times better than I did 
before. [Laughter.] 

I cannot longer detain the Senate in pre- 
senting objections to the exercise of legislative 
power under the guarantee clause. It is suffi- 
cient to control my own action, that I believe 
by the letter, and even spirit of the Constitution, 
the suffrage was placed exclusively under the 
control of State action. I think that the error 
of so placing it is as clear as the error made in 
tolerating slavery. To rid ourselves of the evil, 
however, we must amend the Constitution. 

Mr. SUMNER. Do I understand my friend 
to say that a State might adopt a rule, for in- 
stance, founded on the color of the hair, so that 
all men with light hair should be excluded from 
the right of suffrage ? I insist that a State is not, 
under the Constitution of the United States, 
authorized to make any exclusion on account 
of color. 

Mr. HENDERSON. It ought not to be, you 
mean. 

Mr. SUMNER. No ; it cannot be. Color 
cannot be a qualification. There may be a quali- 
fication founded on age or residence or knowl- 
edge or crime. 

Mr. HENDERSON. You are now coming 
in conflict with the committee of fifteen, who 
declare by their resolution that the States now 
have the power, and may yet exclude everybody 
of a particular race or color. 

Mr. SUMNER. I understand that the com- 
mittee propose to place that in the Constitution 
of the United States, and that is one reason why 
I object to their report. I say that they pro- 
pose to do what our fathers never did. 

Mr. HENDERSON. The Senator from Mas- 
sachusetts is in theory perhaps correct. He 
is speaking, however, of an ideal constitution. 
The true republican principle requires that as 
large a portion of the people, as is consistent 
with the public good, shall be permitted to vote. 



38 



crimination between tlie races in political rights 
and privileges. This would give the ballot and 
an equal right to hold ofSce. The position of 
the Senator is au advanced one, and merits 
approbation. He prefers for himself, I take 
it, the simplified proposition I offer, to the com- 
mittee's measure, wliich is duplex and evasive. 

Mr. FESSENDEN. I would have the Sen- 
ator not misapprehend me. He speaks as if I 
disapproved uf the action of the committee. 

Mr. HEXUERSON. That is an inference 
of mine from the course of the Senator's speech 
to which I listened with pleasure. 

Mr. FESSENDEN. I do not disapprove it 
in any shape or form. ^A'hile 1 took the liberty 
to state what I preferred if it could be had, I 
did not undertake to say that under the circum- 
stances it would be wise to do it. 

Mr. HENDERSON. I understand the Sen- 
ator. Ele admits the correctness of my views, 
but thinks them inexpedient. 

Mr. FESSENDEN. I spoke of my own par- 
ticular views in relation to that matter ; but a 
man cannot always press his views against what 
may be his sense of propriety or i^rospect of suc- 
cess. A legislator must legislate for something 
that he can accomplish. 

Mr. HENDERSON. When I remarked that 
"the Senator admits the correctness of my 
views,'" I regarded his views, as expressed in 
the proviso I have read, and my own views, as 
almost identical. At least they are substan- 
tially so. And I cannot be mistaken that the 
distinguished Senator's speech clearly indi- 
cated a preference by him for a plain, positive 
statement that the suffrage should be granted, 
over one permitting the States to exclude whole 
races of men in defiance of every principle of 
republican theory. 

Mr. KlRlvWOOD. Will the Senator from 
Missouri allow me to ask him a question? I 
want to understand him if I can. Do I under- 
stand him to say that Congress by this amend- 
ment confers on the States a power that they 
do not now have? 

Mr. HENDERSON. Certainly not. I did 
not say so. 

Mr. KIRKWOOD. I understood him to 
argue as if it was so. 

Mr. HENDERSON. I see what the Sena- 
tor is aiming at, I think. He intrenches him- 
self behind the provisions of the present Con- 
stitution when he needs its shelter. It is good 
when it answers the purpose of his argument, 
but bad when it does not. He asks me if the 
States cannot now exclude the negro from the 
ballot. I answer, yes. But I thought we were 
amending the Constitution. Iowa refuses ne- 
gro suffrage, and can do so after this commit- 
tee amendment shall have been adopted with- 
out losing a member in Congress. No southern 
State can do so. The Senator seems more 
anxious to destroy the political power of cer- 
tain States than to do justice to an oppressed 
race. It is true, under the Constitution as it 
now is, the States may exclude the negro from 
eufixaige, but they may exclude him without 



loss of political power in Congress. He is 
willing to let the States continue to exclude 
the negro because, forsooth, it is the present 
Constitution. If so, why not stand by the 
Constitution throughout, and still let them 
retain their representation? If the existing 
Constitution is good against my argument, it is 
good against his. 

Mr. KIRKWOOD. That is not the question. 
_ Mr. HENDERSON. But that is the ques 
tion. 

Mr. KIRKWOOD. Not according to myj' 
view. I understand the Senator to argue thai ' 
we are about conferring on these States a priv 
ilege they have not had before. I do not sc 
regard it. If the Senator argues that under 
the Constitution there is no such power now, 
but that we are granting them a power, he is 
correct; but if they have that power, we are 
simply not interfering with that provision of the 
Constitution. That is all. 

Mr. HENDERSON. I appreciate the Sen- 
ator's position, and am glad to have his views, 
but I wish to confine myself to the neighbor- 
hood, at least, of my subject. 

So soon as the rebellion had been put down 
by military force, means ought to have been 
taken to remove forever the causes that pro- 
voked it. The South made the issue boldly in 
the Montgomery confederation. It was not 
slavery especially that induced the separation. 
Slavery was but the incident. It was the infe- 
riority of the black man and his unfitness for 
political association with the white man that 
constituted the corner-stone of the confederate 
fabric. When the fabric was torn down and 
scattered to the winds, the false political teach- 
ings, that entered into its construction, were 
abandoned by the builders. The South not 
only recognized the destruction of slavery on 
the downfall of the rebellion, but they were 
ready to abandon all the dogmas upon which 
slavery was founded. Slavery of white men, 
equals, was not justified by any portion of our 
people. It could only be justified as a guard- 
ianshljj or patriarchal government over an . 
inferior race. If the inferiority were admitted, 
slavery had its defense in some sort of reason. 
But the experiences of the war attacked and 
destroyed this defense, long known to the South 
itself to be utterly untenable. Hence, on sub- 
mitting to the national authority, they equally 
yielded to the logic of events on the negro ques- 
tion. They were ready to give up, in practice 
anyhow, the idea of the negro's inferiority. 
Mr. Calhoun, and other prominent men In the 
South, always held that If the negro were made 
free it was tantamount to a declaration of his 
equality, and his enfranchisement must follow. 

If President Johnson had said in his procla- 
mation of amnesty, "Whereas the people of 
the seceded States organized a rebellion and 
fought for four years against the Govei'ument 
of the United States in an unholy attempt to 
perpetuate the slavery of an entire race, on the 
false ground of the inferiority of that race ; and 
whereas their rebellion has been overthrown, 



39 



now I, Andrew Johnson, desiring to see slavery 
and its attendant evils removed, and that jus- 
tice be established throughout the land, North 
and South, do proclaim that all persons taking 
part in said rebellion shall be pardoned upon 
the express condition that slavery and all its 
pretensions shall be abolished, ' and that all 
distinctions of race and color in civil and polit- 
ical rights shall henceforth cease," would they 
not have accepted it? Would they not have 
> keen glad to accept it? No doubt about it; 
And then this angry controversy, just beginning 
to mold new political organizations, would have 
been unknown. 

Mr. CONNESS. The President tells you 
that he is afraid that would bring about a war 
of races. 
* Mr. HENDERSON. Simple justice never 
made war. To show that I am not mistaken in the 
expectations of the country, North and South, 
on this subject, I refer first to the testimony of 
Mr. Reagan, of Texas, who was the postmaster 
general under the rebel government, and was 
one of the most active and persistent of rebel 
chiefs. His testimony is but the expression of 
a then fixed public sentiment at the South. 
He says, in a letter addressed to the people of 
Texas, just after the fall of the confederacy : 

t "I have no doubt you can adopt a plan which will 
f&lly meet the demands of justice and fairness, and 
satisfy the northern mind and the requirements of 
tho Government, without endangering good govern- 
ment and the repose of society. This can be done by 

"First, extending the privileges and protection of 
the laws over negroes as they are over the whites, and 
allowing them to testify in the courts on the same 
conditions; leaving their testimony subject to the 
rules relating to its credibility ; but not objecting to 
its admissibility. And in this you will conform with 
the wise current of legislation, and the tendency of 
all judicial decisions in all enlightened countries. 

"And second, by fixing an intellectual, moral, and, 
if thought necessary, a property test for the admission 
of all persons to the exercise of the elective franchise, 
without reference to race or color, which would secure 
its intelligent exercise." 

In enumerating the advantages of these sug- 
gestions, he says : 

r "First. It would remove all just grounds of antag- 
'i onlsm and hostility between the white and black 
races. Unless this is done endless strife and bitter- 
ness of feeling must characterize their relations, and, 
as all history and human experience teach us, must 
sooner or later result in a war of races. We now 
know from sad experience what war is between 
equals and enlightened people. But of all wars a 
social war of races is the most relentless and cruel, 
the extermination or expulsion from the country or 
enslavement of one or the other being the inevitable 
end where they are left to themselves, or the loss of 
liberty to both races where they are both sirioject to 
the control of a superior power, which would be our 
situation. I speak, of course, of the legal rights and 
status of the two races. Their social relations are 
matters of taste and choice, and not subject to legis- 
lative regulation. * 

"Second. This course would disarm and put an end 
to inter-State sectional political agitation, on this 
subj ect at least, which has been the special curse of our 
country fm- so many years, and which was the cause 
of the unnumbered woes wo have recently experi- 
enced and still suffer; by depriving the agitators of 
a subject on which to keep up such an agitation, and 
of the means of producing jealousy, animosity, and 
hatred between the ditierent races. And this would 
do much toward the renewal of the ancient rela- 
tions of national harmony and fraternal good will 
between all parts of the country." 



The President of the United States, who is 
now supposed to be so utterly opposed to negro 
suffrage, oven as late as October last, author- 
ized a publication by one Major Stearns, giving 
his opinion most decidedly in its favor. The 
President said : 

"My positiou here is different from what it would 
be if I were in Tennessee. 

"There I should try to introduce negro suffrage grad- 
ually; first, those who had served in the Army; those 
who could read and write, and perhaps a iiroperty 
qualification for others, say two hundred or two hun- 
dred and fifty dollars." 

In the early days of last October, I had a con- 
versation myself with tho President, in which 
I expressed some fears of the loyalty of the new 
organizations, and took occasion to suggest the 
hope that he would insist on some sort of modi- 
fied negro suffrage in those States, as a means 
of taking the question forever out of politics, 
and further, of removing, as far as possible, 
the false sentiments that originated and gave 
strength to the rebellion. The result of the 
conversation was that I was authorized to give 
publicity to his views, which I did in a speech 
of October 21, in my State, from which I read 
an extract: 

" Taking his stand-point that theStates are still in 
the Union, he does not think he can consistently in- 
terfere with the franchisQ in those States or in any 
other; that is, that he can confer it upon persons not 
enjoying it under the respective State constitutions, 
as they existed before the rebellion; but as an indi- 
vidual hedesiresthatthe negro shall be enfranchised 
and would be gratified to see the several State con- 
ventions extend the franchise to all persons of color 
who can read the Constitution of the United States 
in English and write their names, and also to all per- 
sons of color who own real estate valued at not less 
than S250, and who pay taxes thereon." 

I again repeat that these words were uttered 
to me by the President of the United States in 
the early days of October last, and now it is 
given out that the President is opposed to 
negro suffrage, not only in the States, but in 
the District of Columbia, where the power of 
Congress is not disputed. On the 10th of last 
October, the President addressed a regiment of 
negro soldiers, returning from service, in which 
he said : 

"This is your country as well as anybody else's 
country. This is the country in which you expect to 
live and in which you expect to do something by your 
example in civil life, as you have done in the field. 
This country is founded on the principle of equality." 

Again : 

"It is for you to establish the great fact that you 
are fit and qualified to be free." 

And again : 

"He is the most exalted that is the mos* meritori- 
ous, without regard to color." 

But it seems now the question of the negro's 
capacity to govern himself is not to be judged 
from his conduct. It is to be settled against 
him without trial. Merit is to be put out of 
the question. His inferiority is to be assumed, 
and the results of injustice to him, ignorance, 
poverty, degradation, are to be forever the 
quoted evidences of that inferiority. The ques- 
tion of human slavery entered into party poli- 
tics, and justice was slow. The question of 
human right, involved in enfranchisement, is 



40 



now given to party politics. Justice may be 
slow, but come, it must. 

Against this measure but three arguments 
are urged : 

1. That it produces social equality. This 
objection is totally unfounded. Is each voter 
the equal of another? Does my friend from 
Wisconsin [Mr. Doolittle] regard every man, 
native and foreign, naturalized and unnatural- 
ized, who is entitled to the ballot iu that State, 
as his social equal ? 

2. It is urged that the negro is of another 
and an inferior race. Admit his race to be 
different from ours, does he not belong to the 
family of man? Is he not actuated by the same 
motives, possessed of the same feelings, and 
animated by the same hopes? He may not 
belong to the same race, but he belongs to the 
family of man, and the proudest boast of our 
free country to-day, is, that it is the home and 
asylum of man. If his race be inferior in intel- 
lectual power, that constitutes the strongest 
reason for guarding his rights against the as- 
saults of the more vigorous and crafty. Are 
all men now entitled to the franchise equal 
in intellectual power? Are they all equal in 
sagacity and knowledge? Is the unlettered 
Irishman, shut out year after year from the 
light of the sun, in the coal mines of Peunsjd- 
vania, equally qualified to cast an intelligent 
vote with the distinguished members of the 
Federal judiciary now dispensing justice in this 
Capitol? But I ask. Senators, will you deny 
suffrage to the coal-digger? Or will you give 
another ballot to the eminent judge? Natural 
inferiority amounts to nothing. The question is, 
are the negroes capable of such moral training 
as to give them love of social order, and such 
intellectual training as to have them know and 
appreciate their rights and duties in the com- 
munity ? If they are incapable of such training, 
the States may yet deny them the franchise, 
after my amendment has been adopted. If the 
alleged inferiority prove unfounded, the wor- 



ship of prejudice must cease, and the image of 
this unjust god be broken into dust. Can the 
experiment do any harm? Let us try it. 

3. It is said that qualified, educated, intelli- 
gent negro suffrage will bring a war of races. 
XVhy so? Are white men so unjust that rather 
than suffer simple justice to be done to their 
fellow-men, rather than see the true republican 
principle vindicated in government, they will 
imbrue their hands in the negro's blood? I 
believe no such thing, and if I did believe it, I 
could scarcely hope for the success of my fel- 
low white men in this war against humanity. 
If it be desirable to prevent a war of races, it 
can be done by simple justice to both races. If 
one race be taxed without representation, fol- 
lowed by the usual abuses of such power, and 
followed, too, by the prejudice and contempt 
of the ruling class, will not war of races come 
sooner? It must, it will come. It can be pre- 
vented now. Let it be done. 

The reasons in favor of my proposition are 
inseparably connected with all I have said. I 
need not repeat them. Every consideration of 
peace demands it. It must be done to remove 
the relics of the rebellion. It must be done 
to pluck out political disease from the body- 
politic, and restore the elementary principles 
of our Government. It must be done to pre- 
serve peace iu the States and harmony in our 
Federal system. It must be doue to assure the 
happiness and prosperity of the southern people 
themselves. It must be done to establish in our 
institutions the principles of universal justice. 
It must be done to.secure the strongest .possible 
guarantees against future wars. It must be 
done in obedience to that golden rule, which 
insists upon doing to others what we wovjld that 
others should do unto us. It must be done if 
we would obey the moral law that teaches us to 
love our neighbors as ourselves. In fine, it 
must be done to purify, strengthen, and per- 
petuate a Government, in which are now fondly 
centered, the best hopes of mankind. 



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